***Mar 2006 Focus pg 1-32 - Focus Magazine

at a glanceWho’s tracking you?Local surveillance round-upAFTER DISCOVERING that local police areconducting illegal mass surveillance throughtheir automatic licence plate recognition (ALPR)program, Focus tried to find out which otherlocal public bodies are conducting video surveillanceon the general public. So far, we’ve foundnothing too worrying—except for schoolchildrenin the western communities.The City of Victoria is using ALPR camerasto monitor parking and issue tickets. Theyretain the images of illegally-parked cars forseven years, but theirprivacy impact assessmentindicates that theyonly retain the dataabout law-abiding driversfor 12 hours.The City has awebcam pointed at theJohnson Street Bridgeto document and displaybridge construction. The City also has securitycameras at its parkades, and at its publicservice centre and Crystal Pool cash-handlingareas, for which the privacy policies are apparentlycurrently being updated and weren’tavailable for our review.ICBC has installed 140 cameras through itsIntersection Safety Camera program, includinglocally at Blanshard/Hillside and Highway1/Tillicum. According to ICBC media repAdam Grossman, these cameras only fire whena car goes through a red light.BC Ferries has many surveillance cameras,but does not currently use ALPR. However,when Focus obtained their privacy impactassessment, BC Ferries had censored key informationabout how long they’re keeping theirsurveillance footage, and who can view thefootage and for what reasons. We’ve lodgeda complaint: If police didn’t have a legitimatelaw enforcement reason to censor such information,what reason can BC Ferries have forhiding it from the public?BC Transit has taken over three monthsto provide a copy of the privacy impact assessmentfor their bus surveillance cameras. They’vebeen “testing” some cameras in some buses inthe past, but this year have been discussingplans to install video and possibly audio surveillancethroughout the fleet.The Greater Victoria School District hasa very thoughtful, privacy-protective policy,clearly designed to prevent surveillance ofour children and to ensure that securitycameras are only used for crime preventionin or around schools at night. Their policyexplicitly forbids video surveillance beingused “during normal school hours except inextraordinary circumstances.” Currently,there’s only one camera on SpectrumCommunity School’s parking lot.In our neighbouring western communities,it’s a different story. The Sooke School District(including Sooke, Langford, Colwood andMetchosin) has eight secondary and middleschools—four of them have video surveillanceinside the schools, and twomore have video surveillanceboth inside andoutside. Even one elementaryschool has surveillancecameras outdoors. There’salso video surveillance onthree district school buses.According to the SookeSchool District policies,they’re keeping all the video footage for aminimum of 30 days, parents are allowed toview the footage, and there’s even a clause forthe Superintendent to authorize surveillanceof private meeting rooms and bathrooms.Yikes. When, how, and why did the westerncommunities public school system become alock-down surveillance state? More to comeon this story.—Rob WipondGlobal psychiatric war hits homeThousands of Victorians affectedTHE INTERNATIONAL WAR raging betweenthe titans of psychiatry and psychology maynot seem like “local” news.However, tens of thousandsof local citizens havebeen seriously injured andnow desperately needcaring attention.The stage was set 20years ago, with the fourthedition of the AmericanPsychiatric Association’s (APA) Diagnostic andStatistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM),the “bible” of mental illnesses. In recent years,Dr Allen Frances, who chaired that DSM-IV’stask force, has been writing publicly about hismistakes and regrets, and warning about theupcoming DSM-5. Frances has apologizedDr Allen Francesprofusely about how the DSM-IV led to diagnosesof ADHD, depression and bipolarspreading through the general population likeflu bugs. And Frances recently lamentedthat DSM-5, finally released this May, is similarly“a reckless and poorly written documentthat will worsen diagnostic inflation” and“increase inappropriate treatment” as it definesnormal, common levels of concern about physicalhealth problems, grieving over a loss, andmild forgetfulness as mental illnesses requiringpsychiatric drugs.Frances’ credibility has lent weight to a broadmovement against DSM-5. For example, apetition launched by the American PsychologicalAssociation and so far signed by thousands ofheavyweights of mental health from aroundthe world warns that the DSM has not beensubject to independent scientific reviews andis “dangerous” to the public. Everyone, theyargue, “should avoid use of DSM-5.”Subsequent media coverage has been largelycritical or even mocking of psychiatry’s seemingdesire to diagnose, drug, and profit from everyaspect of the human condition. In late April,mounting public embarrassment finally ledeven the US National Institute of MentalHealth, the US government’s psychiatric fundingand research arm, to distance itself. NIMHDirector Dr Thomas Insel criticized the DSM-5’s “lack of validity,” and its diagnostic criteriabased in backroom negotiations and “not anyobjective laboratory measure.” The government,Insel wrote, would henceforth be“orienting” its funding more towards genuineneuroscientific research.The British Psychological Society then issueda call to throw out the whole notion thatany mental-emotional distresses should belabelled as “diseases” or “illnesses” at all. TheBPS argued we should be looking at andresponding to all the social, economic, biograph-8 June 2013 • FOCUS