Block Amazon Sidewalk? And the Other Smart Water
Whose Streets? Our Streets! (Tech Edition) Issue 2
Whose Streets? Our Streets! (Tech Edition) documents trends in the surveillance of public space. Curated by Rebecca Williams and Madeleine Smith as part of "smart city" surveillance research for the Technology and Public Purpose Project at Harvard Kennedy School's Belfer Center. Subscribe now so you don’t miss an issue and help us spread the word to folks who would enjoy this content.
City Watch
Detroit, MI, U.S. - “A $2.5 million plan to install hundreds of traffic light-mounted cameras at city intersections is getting community pushback over privacy and racial discrimination concerns.” [Detroit News via Justice Tech Download]
Moscow, Russia - “Moscow’s Information Technology Department has posted a tender for the development of a system that will build detailed ‘digital profiles’ for all users of municipal services, as well as constantly monitor the activities of Muscovites throughout the city and at municipal facilities.” [Meduza]
Varanasi, India - “Now, Varanasi, a city in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, is installing a new network of CCTV cameras that will include automated facial recognition cameras (AFRS)...The project will connect all the police stations in the city to this CCTV network, with 500 kilometres of optical fibre being laid at 700 points in the city. This advanced technology is meant to help identify people by matching their digital images, photos and video feed with the existing database. The new CCTV camera network is part of a government-sponsored “Smart City” project.” [VICE]
Uganda - Uganda is using facial recognition technology to crack down on dissent during anti-government protests: “Local and international rights groups say footage from the Huawei surveillance cameras has been used since 2019 to monitor political rallies and other events of president Museveni’s opponents.” [Quartz Africa]
Market Watch
Amazon Sidewalk - “Amazon Sidewalk will create entire smart neighborhoods...Launching soon via Echo speakers and all sorts of other devices, Amazon's low-bandwidth IoT network lets your smart home stretch beyond Wi-Fi range...You'll share that bandwidth with your neighbors, creating a sort of network of networks that any Sidewalk-compatible device can take advantage of. Along with making sure things like outdoor smart lights and smart garage door openers stay connected when your Wi-Fi can't quite reach them, that'll help things like Tile trackers stay in touch if you drop your wallet while you're out on a walk, or if your dog hops the fence. “ [CNET via @hypervisible]
Asia Bank UOB Smart City Financing - A Singapore-headquartered bank announced a commitment to sustainable financing to supply 30 megacities (i.e., cities exceeding 10 million population) with smart city technologies by 2030. A smart city is defined as one that “integrates physical infrastructure and digital spaces, through the use of technology, into human habits and behaviours to enable a more environmentally-sustainable city and provides a higher quality of life for all residents.” [Investable Universe]
“Smart water” - “For the last decade, cities around the world have been rolling out ‘smart water’ technologies for both environmental monitoring and resource management...Cities with this kind of smart water infrastructure already in place can adapt the same technology for the early detection of Covid-19 outbreaks in specific buildings or hotspots.” [Financial Times]
Video surveillance and 5G - “Video surveillance cameras will be the largest market for 5G Internet of Things (IoT) solutions worldwide over the next three years according to Gartner, Inc. and will represent 70% of the 5G IoT endpoint installed base in 2020.” [Cities Today]
Policy Watch
U.S. Federal - “Amazon and Microsoft have hired lobbyists [for facial recognition technology]. So too have airlines, retailers, wireless carriers, and cruise operators...A WIRED review of congressional lobbying filings shows that mentions of the technology jumped more than four-fold from 2018 to 2019, and are on track to reach new heights in 2020.” [WIRED]
U.S. Federal - Opinion: Given the news of China using US-made surveillance technology to monitor its Uighur Muslim population, president-elect Biden will need to confront technology potential controls and sanctions. [Washington Post]
Various Global Cities - “U.N. Panel: Technology in Policing Can Reinforce Racial Bias. The use of artificial intelligence and facial recognition programs may lead communities to lose trust in law enforcement, human rights experts say.” [New York Times]
Watching the Watchers Watch
Beijing, China - “How to Evade Big Brother: An Artist’s Guide. Deng Yufeng dreams of walking the Chinese capital unwatched. But as he’s discovered, dodging the city’s surveillance cameras takes almost superhuman ingenuity and determination.” [Sixth Tone]
Bonus Section...A Paper to Watch, um, Read
📄 Paper: Democratic Data: A Relational Theory For Data Governance by Salome Viljoen [SSRN]