Britons angry over trash bin tracking

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Begin forwarded message:

From: Bob Rosenberg <bob.redmountain () gmail com>
Date: February 25, 2007 3:24:37 AM EST
To: dave () farber net
Subject: Britons angry over trash bin tracking

Prof. Farber

For IP maybe.

Where is George Orwell when we need him?

Bob


Arizona Republic
Britons angry over trash bin tracking
http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/news/articles/ 
0225britainBins0225.html#

Liz Ruskin
McClatchy Newspapers
Feb. 25, 2007 12:00 AM
LONDON - The British tolerate millions of surveillance cameras  
watching their every public move. They agreed to let roadside cameras  
record their vehicular movements and store the information for two  
years. But when they discovered that their garbage is being bugged,  
they howled that Big Brother had gone too far.

Local governments have attached microchips to some 500,000 "wheelie  
bins," the trashcans that residents wheel to the curb for collection.  
The aim, they say, is to help monitor collections and boost the  
national recycling rate, now among the lowest in Europe.

The public has reacted with suspicion and fury.
advertisement


"Germans Plant Bugs in Our Wheelie Bins," a Daily Mail headline  
announced in August. Two of the bin manufacturers are German.  
Newspaper letter writers have taken to calling it "Bin Brother."

A member of Parliament from London's Croydon neighborhood denounced  
the chip as "the spy in your bin."

Small-scale revolts have erupted across the United Kingdom for  
months, as different localities adopt the technology. Some towns  
failed to mention the new feature, which is concealed under coin- 
sized plugs under the rims of their garbage cans.

In the coastal city of Bournemouth, 72-year-old Cyril Baker ripped  
the chip off his new bin the day he discovered it, then went on  
national television to show how he did it. Thousands of his neighbors  
followed his example. "It was a very emotional issue. The whole town  
was in an uproar," he said.

The microchips - radio frequency identification transmitters known as  
RFID tags - can't actually spy on the contents of a bin. They're more  
like tiny digital nametags, but they hold lots of information and can  
be scanned from yards away.

In parts of Germany and Belgium, garbage trucks equipped with scales  
and scanners lift the tagged bins. The bins are weighed as they're  
emptied, and residents are charged for each pound they send to the  
landfill.

Bournemouth administrators swear that they intend only to monitor  
trash trends and return lost bins to their assigned homes.


Copyright © 2007, azcentral.com. All rights reserved.







-------------------------------------------
Archives: http://v2.listbox.com/member/archive/247/@now
Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com