[pton_xd]

"Last May, EFF reported that a sheriff’s office in Texas searched data from more than 83,000 automated license plate reader (ALPR) cameras to track down a woman suspected of self-managing an abortion."

These people really have nothing better to do?

[monksy]

I've got distant family members in law enforcement. They brag about the reach of their equipment to surveil. Yes, they enjoy being overly suspicious.

[estearum]

Suspicious? The word is abusive. Of the law, of their uniform, of their fellow citizens.

[cucumber3732842]

>These people really have nothing better to do?

Making examples out of some number of unlucky peasants over otherwise trivial deviance that harms nearly nobody is one of the key jobs of men at arms.

Now, they may spend more time on "real crime" or collecting taxes by other names, but make no mistake this sort of stuff is stuff they (as an agency) must do if they are to properly serve the interests of their master.

[jkahrs595]

They literally think they are doing the work of some divine creator. They have plenty of time to ruin the lives of other people because they think it saves their own.

[estearum]

Really insightful comment. Couldn't agree more.

And many of these people really do need their Good Works on the force to do the saving, because God knows what they do to their wives and kids back home.

[SAI_Peregrinus]

They also believe in eternal torture as punishment. If someone doesn't accept their god, their god will send that person's soul to hell to be tortured forever. Therefore, essentially anything can be justified to force people to accept their god, since no finite amount of harm can exceed the infinite torture of hell.

People who believe that sort of thing are, IMO, extremely evil, and worshiping an evil deity.

[paytonjjones]

> from more than 83,000 automated license plate reader

This feels purposefully misleading. Did they manually watch hours and hours of footage, or is this the equivalent of "I searched an online corpus of hundreds of millions of documents" (I Googled it)

[cosmicgadget]

Doesn't feel misleading at all, "searched data from" is pretty much your "I Googled it" without branding.

The inclusion of 83,000 seems more intended to quantify the scope of the surveillance accessible to these sheriffs.

[morkalork]

Sure, call it that. They Googled it on their comperensive, nation-wide, unlimited access, fully indexed and integrated surveillance network (with 83,000 edge nodes)

[godwinson__4-8]

There is no rest for the wicked.