Rise of the Surveillance Scooters?

Imagine being falsely accused of a crime, and even though you know you did nothing wrong, youre forced to wear a tracking device that monitors every time you leave the house: where you go, when, and for how long. Even though youre completely innocent, suddenly every errand and day trip is recorded, indefinitely, to be scrutinized, analyzed, and maybe even used against you. Go to the doctor? They know. Go to AA? They know. Go anyplace where you prize your anonymity, and the government will still know.

Under Los Angeless new Mobility Data Specification, this could become the reality of millions of Angelenos in the coming months. No, Im not actually talking about accused criminals these Californians are charged with any no crime rather, Los Angeles will deploy a massive surveillance dragnet targeting the less than menacing threat posed bybikes and scooters. Thats right, a city-wide, real-time tracking network, a veritable Orwellian surveillance state, targeting the same sort of scooters popular with middle schoolers.

Bikeshares and e-scooters have proliferated throughout the country, the bicycle or scooter equivalent of rideshares like Uber or Lyft. Users use an app to find the bikes and scooters throughout the city, renting them for short periods, and then dropping them off wherever it is most convenient. Whatever you think of these bikes and scooters, most of us dont think theyre the sort of national security threat that requires us to tear-up the Fourth Amendment and destroy the right to privacy. Sadly, Los Angeles Disagrees. Read the rest