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High Quality Satellite Images - Next Privacy Issue?
According to a report in the January 27th issue of The Wall Street Journal, the use of high quality satellite images by various "authorities" aross the United States is proliferating to the point where American privacy advocates are questioning whether satellite surveillance amounts to invasion of privacy.
Use of satellite images has increased markedly since the early 1990s, when the Russians began selling spy-quality photos to raise cash. The United States lifted its restrictions on sale of high- resolution satellite photos in 1994 - which encouraged entrepreneurs to launch satellites that could compete with Russian imagery. This year a Lockheed-Martin/Raytheon joint venture hopes to launch a satellite that will yield images detailed enough so a minivan can be distinguished from a sedan.
In recent years, various state and local agencies in the United States have used high-resolution satellite images for everything from surveying illicit crops to detecting unauthorized building. The American Bar Association has organized a task force to explore whether taking high-resolution satellite photos of Americans without their knowledge violates the U.S. Constitution's Fourth Amendment protections against unreasonable searches. Because U.S. Justice Department officials are membersof the task force, the recommendations are expected to influence how law-enforcement authorities and civil agencies can use new satellite images, and at what point they require warrants. The U.S. Supreme Court has indicated that, at some point in the future, warrants may be necessary before authorities are to be allowed to use extremely high-resolution images in civil and criminal proceedings. The report was written by Journal staff reporter Ross Kerber and appears on page B1.
News Organizations & Data Quality - Rules in Flux
An article in the January 27th issue of The New York Times explores the changing demands of the marketplace for information and the concomitant changes in the rules that govern what is and what is not reported by the media. According to the Times, the issue is basically whether news organizations should report information they can't prove, but that the public will hear about anyway from other sources, or whether a newscast or newspaper should only contain facts that are known or believed to be true.
According to the Times, the media marketplace has been transformed in recent years by such forces as the Internet and 24-hour cable news on television. Both forces have intensified the pressures under which news is gathered and accelerated the pace at which it is spread. The conflict between old and new rules appears to be altering the standards news organizations use to determine whether to air a story. In the past, the standard that most journlists abided by was verifiying information with one or two independent sources. But in today's competitive media marketplace it has become common for journalists to attribute sensational news to unnamed "sources," and then qualify the veracity of the sources. The new standard for newsgathering poses a significant risk that the published account will not be true. The article was written by Times staff reporter Janny Scott and appears on page A13.