You're lounging on the couch, surfing aimlessly in www-land. Why don't you just lie there and make some money? By catching criminals. Online. Three years ago, The Internet Eyes was launched in Great Britain . A company that does crowd sourcing crime prevention, or: live streaming of surveillance videos to have thieves in stores caught by the general public.
It started with the entrepreneur Tony Morgan , who wanted to use the security cameras in a different way after visiting a Cash & Carry. Why not let people at home watch live with the already installed cameras, in order to reduce the crime figures a bit? Why not involve the community for that?
You register as a potential private eye
And so it happened. In short, it works like this: you register as a private eye in the making (you remain anonymous) and you are shown images of shops that are more than half an hour away from your postcode. This is to prevent recognition of thieving acquaintances or entrepreneurs you know. You watch the surveillance images live and if you see someone putting something in his or her bag or under clothes, you immediately report this with an alert.
iPhoto-1The entrepreneur receives the alert with the images directly on his or her phone and can thus catch the thief. The witness and tipster at home on the couch receives a compensation of approximately 10 British pounds if successful. You may submit a maximum of five alerts per month, to prevent abuse of the system.
A large number of retail chains and individual entrepreneurs use the services of The Internet Eyes. Anyone who considers that almost 1 billion euros is stolen in British shops every year, understands the success of this new form of crime fighting. There is now also a whole army of volunteers consisting of thousands of 'spies and voyeurs'. Worldwide, because you do not necessarily have to live in Great Britain to be allowed to watch.
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It's a matter of choosing
It was to be expected that the discussion about invasion of privacy south korea mobile phone number list would flare up. Organizations such as Big Brother Watch called on the government to investigate this initiative, but in Great Britain privacy laws are less strict than in other countries. In the Netherlands, CCTV footage of 'head kickers' is seen as an invasion of privacy, on the other side of the North Sea an average thief can also be found on the Facebook page of The Internet Eyes.
Strict privacy laws have so far prevented The Internet Eyes from becoming a global player, although Canada is already among the potential customers. The debate about privacy is still current and plays out in many forms. Think of Wikileaks , Bradley/Chelsea Manning and Edward Snowden .
In this case, it is a choice. Do you want to rid the world of one evil ( shoplifting )? Or do you never want to be able to shop innocently and anonymously without the public watching?
Photo intro courtesy of Fotolia