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Databases Transportation United Kingdom

UK Launches National Dashcam Database For Snitching On Bad Drivers (cnet.com) 235

An anonymous reader quotes a report from CNET: Drivers in England and Wales now have a direct line to police for ratting on their fellow motorists, thanks to a new national dash cam database. The National Dash Cam Safety Portal, run by UK dashcam manufacturer Nextbase, lets drivers upload footage from their dashcam to a single database and send it directly to police, the BBC reports. Drivers can choose their region of England or Wales and send footage of accidents or illegal behavior on the road directly to local police, as well as sending a witness statement that can then be used in court.
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UK Launches National Dashcam Database For Snitching On Bad Drivers

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  • by welshie ( 796807 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2018 @08:11AM (#56891422)

    The fact that it doesn't include Scotland, or Northern Ireland doesn't really make it a 'UK National' service.

    Admittedly, Scotland does have its own legal system, which may have subtly different procedures to follow.

    Also terms and conditions of the service mean that NextBase is entitled to use your clips in their adverts, or possibly sending them on to those car crash tv shows.

    11. Rights you license

    11.1 When you upload or post content to our site (including, but without limitation dashcam videos), you grant to us a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, non-exclusive, sub-licensable, royalty-free and transferable licence to use, exploit, copy, store, disclose, reproduce, publish, distribute, prepare derivative works of, display, perform and otherwise use that content for any purpose across any media including, but not limited to, promoting the site and its content, promoting our business, and promoting our products and services.

    However, earlier on in the terms, it states that "Whilst you retain legal ownership of your rights in your content, you are required to grant us the license described in paragraph 11 (Rights you license)."

    • by mjwx ( 966435 )

      The fact that it doesn't include Scotland, or Northern Ireland doesn't really make it a 'UK National' service.

      Given the fact that this is being run by a private company (dashcam brand Nextbase) who are simply submitting the footage to the police on your bahalf, it's not even an English and Welsh service... Its a private service that will likely be ignored by the Police.

  • This is really stupid.

    I'm not willing to trade off our rights until this is a real-time in-vehicle tagging system with 4k video upload over cellular and police cars flying by to catch the asshole I've tagged.
  • by Bearhouse ( 1034238 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2018 @08:21AM (#56891452)

    It's not "the UK" and it's not a "national database" seemingly run by the Gov. or the police.
    It is a private site, run by a private dashcam company, that just redirects you to the individual police force pace, (England and Wales only, so if it's Scotland or NI you're looking for then you're SOL).

    They are nice-enough to state in their T&Cs that "You may be use [sic] the NDSP to upload footage from any dash cam, action camera, mobile phone or any other type of camera from any manufacturer."

    I bloody well should think so, since they're just linking through to the cops own sites!

    • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2018 @08:30AM (#56891488) Homepage Journal

      It's got police force logos on it, which implies that they endorse it. If they don't then hopefully they will pay Nextbase a visit to sort that out.

      • by mjwx ( 966435 )

        It's got police force logos on it, which implies that they endorse it. If they don't then hopefully they will pay Nextbase a visit to sort that out.

        Do you live in the UK?

        Have you not seen the thousands of Walts on bycyles with yellow POLITE jackets trying to look like they're cops? That matters not.

        For the Johnny Foreigners amongst us, in the UK we've got legions of cyclists wearing vests like this [morebikes.co.uk] so that you might get them confused with one of these [protec-supplies.co.uk].

        Use of police logos is not a crime, hell... we dont even prosecute people who pretend to be police. Also, the logo's are buried down at the bottom of the page next to big writing saying "We suppo

  • by Snotnose ( 212196 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2018 @08:25AM (#56891464)
    Back in the 80s he proposed that drivers get a dart a month. You can shoot that dart at an asshole driver. If a driver collects 3 or more darts they lose driving privileges for a month.

    Simply brilliant

    / RIP funny man
  • Really, what kind of Do-Gooder has the time and energy to upload twenty videos every day? Sure, they're persistent, but there's a limit even with that crowd.

  • Broken cnet link (Score:4, Informative)

    by tomknight ( 190939 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2018 @08:41AM (#56891516) Journal

    Not sure if anyone actually wants to follow the cnet link in TFA, but it's broken. Here's a working one: https://www.cnet.com/uk/news/u... [cnet.com]

  • by Megol ( 3135005 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2018 @08:53AM (#56891552)

    Just as people snitching on child abusers, robbers, rapists, violent thugs is bad! If people want to risk the life of others and behaving dangerously they should be able to without being being told on by stinking rats!

    If this continues drunks can't safely drive home on the wrong side of the road anymore. Incredible.

  • Any of you who lived in communist Poland or Ukraine will agree: A population that informs on itself to the police stops being a civilization and becomes simply a population, living in a culture of suspicion and fear, or passive aggressive seething anger.

    Its starts with reporting bad behavior on the road.. it ends with people who express out loud in a pub their empathy for the peaceful majority of Muslims being dragged from their families in the middle of the night, and never seen again.

    Who'se actually "
    • by sinij ( 911942 )
      Absolutely. This times 100.

      You could have the best intentions with such system, but result will be setting neighbors against each other. There is zero chance this won't be weaponized in some form to settle scores.
    • by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 04, 2018 @10:20AM (#56891800)

      >A population that informs on itself to the police stops being a civilization

      What, so you should never call the police to report something? If you see a murder in progress you should just shrug and carry on? If you see someone walking into a busy area brandishing a knife aggressively then you should just carry on as if nothing happened? If you see someone get dragged into a van kicking and screaming which then drives off at high speed then you should do nothing?

      If you wanted to argue against people reporting each other for comparatively minor things I might understand, but you're saying that people should never assist the police. Your argument is extreme to the point of idiocy. The idea that you can either tell the police nothing or end up in a dystopian police state is a false dichotomy.

      • by klui ( 457783 )

        Just viewing some dashcam channels will show how there are some really bad and dangerous drivers. Love it when they get instant karma.

    • by ledow ( 319597 )

      In the UK this is countered, believe it or not, by the police force.

      They have discretion, common sense, just want to get the job done, aren't interested in pursuing every little spat at gunpoint, but also aren't disinterested if they can see you're worried or have a genuine grievance.

      Most of these will be ignored. Some will result in a little letter saying "We've had a report that... " with zero enforcability. The serious ones will result in a case just as they should.

      But if you haven't lived in the UK, y

    • A population that informs on itself to the police stops being a civilization

      I see. So, if you or someone you loved were attacked in public you would want people to pretend it wasn't happening and for everyone to tell the police they didn't see a thing, yes? Otherwise you are a hypocrite. Hell, I kind of wish I knew where to find you so I could mug your stupid ass then if you reported it to the police I could post it here showing your are a hypocrite.

      In fact, a civilization requires people to follow the laws of the civilization and it requires people to enforce those laws and it r

  • There's a whole bunch of silver surfers who live on Hayling Island, who currently name and shame motorists who drive in less than thoughtful, considerate ways. They currently just take photos on their smart phones (let's not wonder how they manage to take a picture of someone else's driving legally) and post them to the Hayling group on Facebook ..

    This is going to give them a whole new, potentially litigious way of abusing visitors to the island. Wow.

    The police have obviously latched on to rate-driver
  • Why stop with dashcams? I would love to have an app where you could just take a photo of a double parked car, or a dog owner not picking up after, and send it with GPS and time info to the police. Even if most were ignored, as they would surely be, the feeling of having done something would help me.

    A police state is not created because the police have too many information, but because they are not controlled enough.

  • The reasonableness of doing so depends in part on what you do with it. If you warn the person against doing it again, you can set up a situation that when the police catch the person driving recklessly the court can set the punishment based on the total history, not just the incident the police caught.

    Using it to issue warnings would also give the driver an incentive to correct himself.

    So there are socially reasonable ways to use it, if you can get past the whole Big Brother thing.

  • Here is one candidate I would like to nominate for this scheme : https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/... [mirror.co.uk]
  • At least 2 states I know recommend a 3 second gap between cars. Police would not be able to handle the number of complaints about drivers violating this guideline. More than half of all cars on the road at any given time are in violation, about 30% are closer than 1 second, and perhaps 10% closer than 1/2 second. Mile after mile, regardless of speed even 10 mph in excess of the legal limit.
    • by ledow ( 319597 )

      There's a difference between "poor" driving and "dangerous" driving.

      Sure, poor can be dangerous, but it's not automatic.

      Dangerous infers a deliberate, considered action where you know the risk to yourself and others in increased for no good reason.

      My dashcam captures THOUSANDS of incidences of poor driving, everything from not indicating to insufficient braking distance to speeding. And although they are "dangerous" as actions, they are not *legally* "dangerous driving". That's another thing entirely. Th

  • Seriously, BeauHD ?

    Nice to know you think reporting dangerous driving and crimes is a bad thing. Why do asshats like you think like that?

    Reminds me of watching people in a high crime neighborhood crying on the news about how cops don't solve their crimes while watching the same people post on line about "don't snitch". In fact. I literally saw someone one year protesting the police chanting "don't snitch" then a few months later begging people to tell the police what they know, AKA snitching, about the
  • that most drivers considered themselves above average.

    However I can't help noticing when watching dashcam videos on youtube from Russia and America, that they are by far the best drivers in the developed world when it comes to performing spectacular feats of epic failure in the shit driving caught on cam videos.

    We are pretty boring by comparison.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]

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