Topic: Shotspotter

The hosts argue that mass surveillance creates a "guilty until proven innocent" environment, as seen in the use of geofencing data to round up individuals near the Capitol on January 6. They criticize the "safety is a right" sales pitch used by surveillance companies, noting that cameras in cities like Chicago have not prevented high rates of violent crime.

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson announced the city will end its contract with ShotSpotter, a gunfire detection system, fulfilling a campaign promise. While Johnson wants to keep the system active through the Democratic National Convention in August, the company may shut it down sooner. Supporters of the technology argue it saves lives, while critics claim it leads to over-policing in minority neighborhoods.

The California Highway Patrol (CHP) is testing the ShotSpotter system along Highway 4 to detect and locate freeway shootings in real-time. The technology uses acoustic sensors to pinpoint gunfire, which then triggers cameras to capture license plate data. Since 2015, there have been 136 reported freeway shootings in the Bay Area, prompting this high-tech surveillance expansion.

ShotSpotter is a gunfire detection system that uses acoustic triangulation to pinpoint shooting incidents in major cities like Oakland and San Francisco. The hosts question why ShotSpotter data from the Boston Bombing has not been released to clarify the timeline of the shootout between police and the Tsarnaev brothers. They suggest the system is capable of much broader audio surveillance than is publicly admitted.