http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology...news.terrorism

http://www.schneier.com/blog/archive...r_on_phot.html


What is it with photographers these days? Are they really all
terrorists, or does everyone just think they are?

Since 9/11, there has been an increasing war on photography.
Photographers have been harrassed, questioned, detained, arrested or
worse, and declared to be unwelcome. We've been repeatedly told to
watch out for photographers, especially suspicious ones. Clearly any
terrorist is going to first photograph his target, so vigilance is
required.

Except that it's nonsense. The 9/11 terrorists didn't photograph
anything. Nor did the London transport bombers, the Madrid subway
bombers, or the liquid bombers arrested in 2006. Timothy McVeigh
didn't photograph the Oklahoma City Federal Building. The Unabomber
didn't photograph anything; neither did shoe-bomber Richard Reid.
Photographs aren't being found amongst the papers of Palestinian
suicide bombers. The IRA wasn't known for its photography. Even those
manufactured terrorist plots that the US government likes to talk
about -- the Ft. Dix terrorists, the JFK airport bombers, the Miami 7,
the Lackawanna 6 -- no photography.

Given that real terrorists, and even wannabe terrorists, don't seem to
photograph anything, why is it such pervasive conventional wisdom that
terrorists photograph their targets? Why are our fears so great that
we have no choice but to be suspicious of any photographer?

Because it's a movie-plot threat.

A movie-plot threat is a specific threat, vivid in our minds like the
plot of a movie. You remember them from the months after the 9/11
attacks: anthrax spread from crop dusters, a contaminated milk supply,
terrorist scuba divers armed with almanacs. Our imaginations run wild
with detailed and specific threats, from the news, and from actual
movies and television shows. These movie plots resonate in our minds
and in the minds of others we talk to. And many of us get scared.

Terrorists taking pictures is a quintessential detail in any good
movie. Of course it makes sense that terrorists will take pictures of
their targets. They have to do reconnaissance, don't they? We need 45
minutes of television action before the actual terrorist attack -- 90
minutes if it's a movie -- and a photography scene is just perfect.
It's our movie-plot terrorists that are photographers, even if the
real-world ones are not.

The problem with movie-plot security is it only works if we guess the
plot correctly. If we spend a zillion dollars defending Wimbledon and
terrorists blow up a different sporting event, that's money wasted. If
we post guards all over the Underground and terrorists bomb a crowded
shopping area, that's also a waste. If we teach everyone to be alert
for photographers, and terrorists don't take photographs, we've wasted
money and effort, and taught people to fear something they shouldn't.
And even if terrorists did photograph their targets, the math doesn't
make sense. Billions of photographs are taken by honest people every
year, 50 billion by amateurs alone in the US And the national
monuments you imagine terrorists taking photographs of are the same
ones tourists like to take pictures of. If you see someone taking one
of those photographs, the odds are infinitesimal that he's a
terrorist.

Of course, it's far easier to explain the problem than it is to fix
it. Because we're a species of storytellers, we find movie-plot
threats uniquely compelling. A single vivid scenario will do more to
convince people that photographers might be terrorists than all the
data I can muster to demonstrate that they're not.

Fear aside, there aren't many legal restrictions on what you can
photograph from a public place that's already in public view. If
you're harassed, it's almost certainly a law enforcement official,
public or private, acting way beyond his authority. There's nothing in
any post-9/11 law that restricts your right to photograph.

This is worth fighting. Search "photographer rights" on Google and
download one of the several wallet documents that can help you if you
get harassed; I found one for the UK, US, and Australia. Don't cede
your right to photograph in public. Don't propagate the terrorist
photographer story. Remind them that prohibiting photography was
something we used to ridicule about the USSR. Eventually sanity will
be restored, but it may take a while.



--

To avoid situations in which you might make mistakes
may be the biggest mistake of all.

....Peter McWilliams