Smart streetlights hide hockey-puck NEMA nodes that can add cameras, air sensors, and 5G gear with no public vote or new hardware.

Cross posted from https://piefed.social/c/privacy@lemmy.world/p/2212799/you-know-about-flock-cameras-meet-nema-nodes-they-turn-streetlights-into-a-surveillance

Standardized NEMA sockets let municipalities add cameras and air sensors to existing poles with no public vote or new hardware

  • BloodMuffin@lemmy.caEnglish
    4·
    15 hours ago

    as someone that installs streetlights, I have never come across one of these. they are simply photocells. also the only opening in the housing points north, which only allows possible surveillance in one direction.

    i wouldn’t worry about this for now.

    that being said, my country is behind most others as far as surveillance goes

        • Crozekiel@lemmy.zipEnglish
          4·
          11 hours ago

          You can’t control if you are in a place where wifi is turned on… The “wifi radar” doesn’t need you to have a device with wifi on to “see” you - it “sees” YOU in the physical world. Your body blocking the signal.

          Also, on the actual OP subject, a Nema Node is basically just a specific power socket… Wild that they can basically just install extra power outlets all over the city and then later go plug in an AI face tracker 5000 to every one of them with no further oversight just because “the outlet was already there”…

            • Crozekiel@lemmy.zipEnglish
              2·
              11 hours ago

              It seems to me more that they are stating the way the regulations are written, if they install the outlets now, they don’t have to get anyone’s permission to install the surveillance later. Which is wild if true.

              • BloodMuffin@lemmy.caEnglish
                1·
                10 hours ago

                you obviously don’t understand the basics of this topic

                the outlets aren’t be replaced, it’s what is plugged into them.

          • BloodMuffin@lemmy.caEnglish
            1·
            12 hours ago

            i turn off my WiFi everytime I leave home. this prevents my phone from broadcasting my saved WiFi networks. therefore public WiFis can not identify me via that list.

            can you explain to be why that isn’t a viable option?

            • Crozekiel@lemmy.zipEnglish
              3·
              11 hours ago

              Unless we are talking about a different “wifi radar” here, it doesn’t need you to have wifi on your person to track you, the radio waves being emitted by the wifi device (like a router) are being tracked and they can tell where you are and where you are going based on the interference your meat creates. If they have a “wifi radar” on every street light in your city, they could just literally “watch” you from the moment you leave your house. You could be completely tech naked and wearing a full body suit and a mask, but at some point you still had to leave your house, and chances are they can figure out who lives at that address.