Proton hosts Flock map revealing over 300k cameras, defying cease-and-desist
Posted by ryan_j_naughton 23 hours ago
Comments
Comment by drewbitt 3 minutes ago
The snapshot here is 10 months old. Most everything near me is incorrect.
Comment by pardner 16 hours ago
Since the article's link is actually a Proton ad, here's the actual link: https://proton.me/flock-camera-map
Comment by HelloUsername 8 hours ago
Posted earlier: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50222302
Comment by parlortricks 17 hours ago
335k cameras (image in link shows that number)..that is so many, it is hard to imagine.
Such a large spy network on the populace, I wonder if we have this problem in Sydney.
Comment by JumpCrisscross 20 hours ago
Is there a legal path to loading these data into OpenStreetMap?
Comment by Rygian 8 hours ago
Either they were published with a license compatible with ODbL, or there is written permission from the rights holder to import them into OSM, i strongly doubt it.
Comment by dyauspitr 16 hours ago
What sort of legal case does flock have for something people are mapping out in public?
Comment by bdavbdav 4 hours ago
This is the same legal basis cartographers / mapping providers sit on. You could reach exactly the same result, but the process cost them, and the resultant IP, even if derivable from publicly available info (surveying streets, surveying camera locations) isn’t. They can’t come after people mapping cameras they can see, they can come after people scraping their DB / breaking TOS / accessing systems for which they do not have access rights.
Comment by FireBeyond 12 hours ago
Their claim, rightly or wrongly, is that it came from private data (a researcher got an exposed key and downloaded data with coordinates).
But I think as long as Proton wasn't that researcher, there's no case to argue there.