Look At Them Looking At Us

By Hazel Last edited 194 months ago
Look At Them Looking At Us
CCTV.jpg

We celebrated the good guys of the London Ambulance Service and St Johns Ambulance looking out for us on New Year's Eve - but we're a little less jubilant about the crowd of cameras keeping a beady eye on us every day of the year.

A report in September last year said there were 10,000 surveillance cameras in London recording our every move, and putting the UK into the highest ranking country in the EU for 'endemic surveillance.' In a report that covered 75 countries gathered by Privacy International and Electronic Privacy Information Centre, the proposed UK identity scheme for the UK has been deemed the most invasive in the world. And that puts us in the same bracket as China.

There is a good case for constant surveillance - CCTV footage helped catch the July 7 bombers but excessive intrusion into personal privacy creates hostile communities as people begin to feel like criminals . Take a look at this collection of pictures from the Metropolitan Police's special operations room and see what you think of the situation. Is there too much surveillance in London? Is there not enough? While you're pondering that, keep watching the skies - they'll be watching you.

Image courtesy of MykReeve, a regular contributor to the Londonist Flickr Pool.

Last Updated 04 January 2008