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New police radars can 'see' inside homes

245 points by mattee 12y ago

imroot 12y ago
I have a really hard time believing that this will pass constitutional muster if this ever the use of this device ever gets challenged or gets into the court system. One's home is generally sacrosanct -- there are some exceptions, but those are few and far between.
- throwaway90999 12y ago
  There's already been a ruling saying this isn't ok: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyllo_v._United_States http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyllo_v._United_States Kyllo was about thermal imaging but the opinion is quite clear. There's a much, much stronger case for thermal imaging equipment than there is for a device which probes via radio waves.
  - bjt2n3904 12y ago
    Just a few thoughts. Very simplistically... FLIR is a special camera that detects infra-red light. IR is electromagnetic radiation that is emitted from objects with heat. RADAR emits a more "traditional" radio wave, and then detects objects when the radio wave reflects back. Unlike FLIR (which is passive), I would consider RADAR to be active. I would think (rather naively so) that the case against using RADAR without a warrant would be stronger, given that the government would have to actively affect your house. To play devil's advocate, the pot grower was emitting a signal in the FLIR case... Anyone more educated than I able to cast light (haha) on this?
    - deleted 12y ago
      [deleted]
    - gizmo686 12y ago
      One nice thing about the Supreme Court is that every ruling comes with at least one (or two if the ruling is not unanimous) experts explaining the situation. And if any of the remaining Justices disagree, or feel that something was left out, of those two opinions, they can add their own. In this case, the dissent wrote: Unlike an x-ray scan, or other possible "through-the-wall" techniques, the detection of infrared radiation emanating from the home did not accomplish "an unauthorized physical penetration into the premises," and: While the Court "take[s] the long view" and decides this case based largely on the potential of yet-to-be-developed technology that might allow "through-the-wall surveillance," ante, at 38-40; see ante, at 36, n. 3, this case involves nothing more than off-the-wall surveillance by law enforcement officers to gather information exposed to the general public from the outside of petitioner's home. All that the infrared camera did in this case was passively measure heat emitted. https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/533/27/ https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/533/27/
      - throwaway90999 12y ago
        Indeed. The ruling is quite clear that penetrating radio waves into the residence is presumed to be unacceptable. Even the dissent in Kyllo (FLIR) agrees on this point in regard to x-ray.
    - Sir_Substance 12y ago
      But consider: Your house is constantly saturated with radio waves from TV stations, radio stations, wifi etc. What if I were to design a device that passively received reflections of these signals rather then generating it's own to achieve the same function as the device in this post. So I now have the same result, but I am "merely" receiving reflections, rather then making my own. There is no difference in the function, this is rules lawyering at its best. I am willing to let police observe emissions on visible wavelengths ONLY because that is a slippery slope to not being allowed to look into windows. Anything you need a device to view is not ok to view without a warrant, no matter the technique.
      - zaroth 12y ago
        If you look at Gizmo's quotes, I think it's pretty clear they considered these kinds of technology tricks in deciding Kyllo, and 'taking the long view' that high tech collection of passively emitted information requires a warrant. I think the general approach is it's the result that matters, not the specific approach, e.g. 'expectation of privacy'.
- gizmo686 12y ago
  Kyllo v. United States [1] Law enforcement used a thermal imaging camera to detect hotspots consistent with marijuana growth inside Kyllo's house. In a 5-4 decision, the Supreme Court ruled that this was a 4th amendment violation. [1]http://www.oyez.org/cases/2000-2009/2000/2000_99_8508 http://www.oyez.org/cases/2000-2009/2000/2000_99_8508
  - baddox 12y ago
    That's pretty close. I could see it going the other way just as easily.
    - andymcsherry 12y ago
      I would argue the opposite. The dissenting opinion's rationale doesn't hold up in this case > Heat waves, like aromas that are generated in a kitchen, or in a laboratory or opium den, enter the public domain if and when they leave a building. In the case of thermal imaging, you measure light waves that is already leaving the building. In the case of radar, you are actively sending in light waves to bounce off the inside and return to you.
      - baddox 12y ago
        That's certainly true using that reasoning (which, incidentally, I think is ridiculous). Of course, they could come up with a workaround. Like perhaps it's not a violation of property rights for invisible and virtually harmless waves to enter private property, and if they happen to bounce off something and come back to the source for collection and analysis, so be it.
        gizmo686 12y ago
        It is most certainly not a violation of property rights; radio waves are a notable exemption to normal property rights. Not to mention the fact that their are many other radio waves that already enter your private property. They still would need to argue that it is not a 4th amendment violation.
- honeybooboo123 12y ago
  One's home is, demonstrably, not sacrosanct anymore. Welcome to the United Soviet States of America. This (too?) will sound like hyperbole, but.. get out while you can. Look, the staggering insanity of North-Korea has lasted for more than half a fucking century. Would you like to spend the rest of your life in North-Korea? What about an equivalent America?
- bsder 12y ago
  Parallel construction. Once they know what they need to, then they'll make up a "legal" construction for how they got that information.
femto 12y ago
Does the US use "sarking" [1] (metal foil insulation) in house construction? Most Australian houses are wrapped in a layer of metal foil insulation. Presumably that would offer some attenuation to radar, though the windows must still allow radiation though, as mobile phones typically work inside. Perhaps a house with metal foil based window tinting would offer a reasonably complete Faraday cage? [1] http://www.bradfordinsulation.com.au/Products/Residential/Thermal-insulation/EnviroSeal-roof-sarking.aspx http://www.bradfordinsulation.com.au/Products/Residential/Th...
- jzwinck 12y ago
  People use a lot of different construction materials and techniques across the country, but I don't think this "sarking" is common for residences. People don't want to live inside Faraday cages though, for the reason you already mentioned: their mobile phones wouldn't work. Not to mention broadcast television, AM/FM radio, garage door openers, etc.
  - comrh 12y ago
    I've thought about living in one, I only use radio in the car and TV comes in through cables. On the plus side my wifi would be protected from wardriving (or an outside access) as it would never leave the house. Cell service would definitely be a problem though.
    - _cudgel 12y ago
      While this is admittedly off-topic to this thread, I too have given this some thought. I'm coming around to the opinion that losing cell service wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing. I prefer to live in a rural area, and a landline would definitely be cheaper. Ditching the smartphone in favor of a feature phone, which could remain off, battery disconnected, and in it's own little faraday cage in the car -- because being prepared for an emergency is a thing we should all do -- well, it all seems very appealing. Nothing in my pocket, no wifi sniffer gathering the hardware address off my phone, no location tracking services, etc. Best of all, the people in my life would adjust to me not being available 24x7x365. I think that would be highly beneficial when compared to the constant stream of interruptions that seem like an invasion of privacy all on their own.
jonahx 12y ago
As disturbing as the police use is, I am more disturbed by the possibility (inevitability?) of devices like these, and similar audio devices, becoming so cheap and readily available that even basic privacy from strangers while in your home becomes a thing of the past. It seems to me that before too long anyone could pick up audio and video devices for a couple hundred bucks that would allow them to see you in your own house and hear your every word.
- themodelplumber 12y ago
  What if you could get a discount on e.g. your insurance payments for a similar device, permanently mounted on the outside of your residence, and readable on location by law enforcement or other responders (like rescue)? Would you be OK with other people taking the deal?
  - rubencodes 12y ago
    Seems like the type of thing Big Brother would do to make it more palatable. Personally, no, I would never do sacrifice my privacy for whatever amount they'd give you. But I guess that choice is up to each individual, really.
- clavalle 12y ago
  There has to be some equally cheap countermeasures that can be found.
  - foobarqux 12y ago
    It's called metal.
    - sologoub 12y ago
      Can you elaborate?
      - pmalynin 12y ago
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
dhughes 12y ago
What if it's passive? Wifi from the routers of homes emit the RF energy and all the police do is use a detector I could see that as legal since it's energy being emitted just as if it were light shining out a window and you were a silhouette. http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/133936-using-wifi-to-see-through-walls http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/133936-using-wifi-to-see-... >The system, devised by Karl Woodbridge and Kevin Chetty, requires two antennae and a signal processing unit (i.e. computer), and is no larger than a suitcase. Unlike normal radar, which emits radio waves and then measures any reflected signals, this new system operates in complete stealth.
- pithon 12y ago
  I wouldn't consider the passive/active distinction the definition for 'invasive.' I'd consider thermal imaging from the outside of the home w/out a warrant 'invasive', but a thermal camera is just picking up the heat radiated by your body.
  - dalke 12y ago
    The article links to the relevant Supreme Court decision. They, in "Kyllo v. United States, 533 U.S. 27 (2001), held that the use of a thermal imaging, or FLIR, device from a public vantage point to monitor the radiation of heat from a person's home was a "search" within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment, and thus required a warrant." -http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyllo_v._United_States http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyllo_v._United_States The article goes on to say the Supreme Court "specifically noted that the rule would apply to radar-based systems that were then being developed."
    - scott_karana 12y ago
      Thank god for that.
- ObviousScience 12y ago
  There's already precedent about this involving radiated IR, which ruled that police may not use such tools without a warrant, as it violates what people normally consider to be private information. It's possible that different rulings will come in the future, but you have people defending drug dealers to thank for essentially ruling that this requires a warrant at present.
funkdobiest 12y ago
So does using these new devices mean they will be using the flash bangs less? They should be able to see who all is inside and realize a child or person that is not the suspect?
- pavel_lishin 12y ago
  It doesn't sound like it can positively identify people; just pinpoint where they are in the house.
  - ssully 12y ago
    It could help determine if there are infants or children in the house before a raid. Then again it really isn't hard to determine if there are children in a house without advanced tech...
- aptwebapps 12y ago
  This is actually a good point. Under current law they aren't going to be able to use one to gather evidence without a warrant, but if they already have a warrant it might make raids safer. Assuming the tech is any good, that is.
- GFK_of_xmaspast 12y ago
  Of course not, they can't tell the race of the inhabitant.
- peteretep 12y ago
  Exactly. As long as they can get usage under control by making them warrant only, sounds like a good way to start demilitarising the police. Hard to justify going all SWAT if you can see a house contains only two unarmed people in bed.
curiously 12y ago
the transition to a surveillance policing state is nearly complete.
pavel_lishin 12y ago
That story links to https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/1505137-12-6001.html https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/1505137-12-6001.html when talking about a court upholding Denson's conviction, which mentions nothing about using radar to search a house.
- bitchypat 12y ago
  I found it here: http://www.ca10.uscourts.gov/opinions/13/13-3329.pdf http://www.ca10.uscourts.gov/opinions/13/13-3329.pdf
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
ftcHn 12y ago
Any examples of the display output of the radar device?
- Puts 12y ago
  Manual: http://www.range-r.com/documents/RANGER.PDF http://www.range-r.com/documents/RANGER.PDF
- ynasser 12y ago
  It only tells you if there are people inside, either moving or breathing, and how far away they are. There's only text output, no actual images. --------- From the manual: "RANGE-R is designed for simple one-handed operation. Holding RANGE-R to a wall, door or other building structure, the operator simultaneously presses buttons on the sensor’s two sides to begin the analysis. Within three seconds, the system returns a range-to-target result as well as the status of the target, which is indicated as either a mover (Mov) or a breather (Br). The result is displayed to the user in terms of distance in feet to the target on the unit’s LCD. RANGE-R is also capable of detecting and displaying the range of multiple targets. In such cases, the display will alternate through the different ranges of the targets."
- madethemcry 12y ago
  The posted pdf to the manual shows a little bit of the device. But here's another larger and more advanced device (linked in the article). It is doing the same but with an more elaborated output visualization. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bt3ecnqdUCo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bt3ecnqdUCo You can clearly see the output in the video.
  - stickfigure 12y ago
    My mind immediately screamed "game over man, game over!" and reached for the flamethrower.
finid 12y ago
> and similar audio devices, becoming so cheap and readily available that even basic privacy from strangers while in your home becomes a thing of the past. Even at current price ($6000), the thing is cheap, taking into account what it can do. As for privacy, forget about that, at least privacy by default. that's so dead. Start thinking about counter measures.
robmiller 12y ago
My first reaction is that Anne Frank's diary would have been much shorter had this technology existed then.
- frankzander 12y ago
  +1
- onion2k 12y ago
  The problem with that line of thinking is that you're really arguing that an entire technology is 'uninvented' because it could be used for evil. Suggesting that we ought to give up doppler radar entirely, with all its benefits like detecting victims in natural disasters, finding people trapped in fires, detecting criminal suspects, etc because it might be used by the next evil dictator is ridiculous. It's a completely unmeasured response. Besides being impossible to uninvent things, it just means we lose out on potentially useful technology now for an intangible benefit that might never come to pass. The fact that the next evil dictator could have access to tools like this is reason to be vigilant not to let an evil dictator come to power and to be sensible about how we use these tools today to stop them being used in ways we think are unreasonable. It is not a reason to suggest we shouldn't have the tools.
  - stickfigure 12y ago
    Sometimes HN is a joy because you can upvote both the insightful criticism and the eloquent rebuttal.
  - patal 12y ago
    That's absolutely not what parent was arguing, though. Also, that "line of thinking" not necessarily leads there. Accepting the technology is but one step. But we still need to raise moral and ethic questions about it. All parent was really saying is, that the nazis wouldn't have thought twice about using said technology to kill even more people.
    - onion2k 12y ago
Animats 12y ago
That device is more useful for firefighters than for cops. Firefighters need to find people inside burning buildings. Looking for trapped people is one of the more dangerous jobs in firefighting. The fact that it's being sold more to cops than firefighters indicates that cops are getting too much money for tactical gear. The device is a fairly basic Doppler radar, although the sensitivity is impressive. Someone might want to look up the FCC approval data for it to get the full technical specs.
- throwawayranger 12y ago
  L-3 Communications RANGE-R Operator's Manual http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-1.pdf http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-1.pdf Internal Photos http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-2.pdf http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-2.pdf External Photos http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-3.pdf http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-3.pdf Test Report http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-5.pdf http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-5.pdf Handheld Radar Frequency Scanner for Concealed Object Detection U.S. Patent 6,950,054 http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/US6950054.pdf http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/US6950054.pdf
- crypt1d 12y ago
  would the huge increase in heat in such burning buildings hinder the usability of a Doppler radar? I would guess so, as different temperature should mean different speed of sound.
  - A1kmm 12y ago
    It is a radar device so the speed of sound is irrelevant. The speed of light in air (and hence the refractive index) does depend slightly on temperature / pressure, but not by very much: https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/6872/refractive-index-of-air-in-dependence-of-temperature https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/6872/refractive-...
- tzs 12y ago
  > Someone might want to look up the FCC approval data for it to get the full technical specs Someone using a new account named throwawayranger did that and posted the results, but the comment was promptly killed because it was a new account posting via TOR. For those without "showdead" enabled, here is the content of the dead post: ---------------------- L-3 Communications RANGE-R Operator's Manual http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-1.pdf http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-1.pdf Internal Photos http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-2.pdf http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-2.pdf External Photos http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-3.pdf http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-3.pdf Test Report http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-5.pdf http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-5.pdf Handheld Radar Frequency Scanner for Concealed Object Detection U.S. Patent 6,950,054 http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/US6950054.pdf http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/US6950054.pdf
jacquesm 12y ago
What are the power levels this thing emits?
sandworm 12y ago
It's radar. So it is emitting radio waves, with a tiny tiny percent of them bouncing back to the detector. So it can be detected and/or jammed. Assuming these devices work on a very narrow frequency range, it shouldn't be too hard to passively hear them coming. If detectors appear, these devices would become a serious liability for anyone looking to "storm" a residence.
nzealand 12y ago
The Range-r simply tells users how far away movement is occurring in a building. Useful for a no nock entry, but not much more. The bigger issue is the number of tactical police raids on private homes, plus some of the other technologies in development and currently available. Stingray, which is currently in use, acts as a portable cell tower. All cell phone calls in the vicinity of a stingray unit get routed through the mobile cell tower, warrant or not.
Luyt 12y ago
This quote from the article made me think immediately of the 'motion trackers' as used in the Aliens films, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1yNOT6lWedA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1yNOT6lWedA "The radars work like finely tuned motion detectors, using radio waves to zero in on movements as slight as human breathing from a distance of more than 50 feet. They can detect whether anyone is inside of a house, where they are and whether they are moving."
- logfromblammo 12y ago
  For the speculative future sake of humanity, if you ever work on the GUI for one of those things, make sure it has an elevation indicator. More than 1m below the detector, show a downward-pointing triangle. More than 1m above it, show an upward-pointing triangle. Within 1m, show a square. Change the relative size of the icon according to the size of the moving object. Add telltale lines extending from the center of the icon in a contrast color to show direction of motion and speed. I realize that the shortcomings of the device UI were critical to the dramatic tension, but whenever I see that scene in Aliens, I can't help but sympathetically think about the poor military-industrial-complex gadget developer who wasn't even allowed to think about the user experience, because the requirements were determined by someone who would likely never use it, and cast in concrete long before anyone was hired to implement them. And the thing that really kills me is that the person who created those requirements probably based them on a device seen in a sci-fi movie. This is why it is so important for film directors to employ technical consultants whenever they include gadgets and computer monitors. Anything seen on the big screen will have an ongoing and possibly unintended future influence on design.
lotsofmangos 12y ago
That's nothing, wait till they get hold of an ADR scanner, it can chemically identify everything it scans and can do it through miles of rock. In interview, Colin Stove is quoted as referring to it jokingly as a "quadcorder", on the basis that it is much better than a tricorder - http://adrokgroup.com/technology/how-it-works http://adrokgroup.com/technology/how-it-works
kozlinov 12y ago
Privacy? Fuck privacy! The 21st century attitude. People, seriously, we need to do something about it until it is too late.
- hawleyal 12y ago
  I think it's not "fuck privacy", but merely realizing there wasn't really privacy to begin with. More like "privacy is an illusion".
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
tempodox 12y ago
Yikes, that site makes noise shortly after opening it. Fank you very much, will never visit again.

245 points by mattee 12y ago

I have a really hard time believing that this will pass constitutional muster if this ever the use of this device ever gets challenged or gets into the court system. One's home is generally sacrosanct -- there are some exceptions, but those are few and far between.

throwaway90999 12y ago
There's already been a ruling saying this isn't ok: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyllo_v._United_States http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyllo_v._United_States Kyllo was about thermal imaging but the opinion is quite clear. There's a much, much stronger case for thermal imaging equipment than there is for a device which probes via radio waves.
- bjt2n3904 12y ago
  Just a few thoughts. Very simplistically... FLIR is a special camera that detects infra-red light. IR is electromagnetic radiation that is emitted from objects with heat. RADAR emits a more "traditional" radio wave, and then detects objects when the radio wave reflects back. Unlike FLIR (which is passive), I would consider RADAR to be active. I would think (rather naively so) that the case against using RADAR without a warrant would be stronger, given that the government would have to actively affect your house. To play devil's advocate, the pot grower was emitting a signal in the FLIR case... Anyone more educated than I able to cast light (haha) on this?
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
  - gizmo686 12y ago
    One nice thing about the Supreme Court is that every ruling comes with at least one (or two if the ruling is not unanimous) experts explaining the situation. And if any of the remaining Justices disagree, or feel that something was left out, of those two opinions, they can add their own. In this case, the dissent wrote: Unlike an x-ray scan, or other possible "through-the-wall" techniques, the detection of infrared radiation emanating from the home did not accomplish "an unauthorized physical penetration into the premises," and: While the Court "take[s] the long view" and decides this case based largely on the potential of yet-to-be-developed technology that might allow "through-the-wall surveillance," ante, at 38-40; see ante, at 36, n. 3, this case involves nothing more than off-the-wall surveillance by law enforcement officers to gather information exposed to the general public from the outside of petitioner's home. All that the infrared camera did in this case was passively measure heat emitted. https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/533/27/ https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/533/27/
    - throwaway90999 12y ago
      Indeed. The ruling is quite clear that penetrating radio waves into the residence is presumed to be unacceptable. Even the dissent in Kyllo (FLIR) agrees on this point in regard to x-ray.
  - Sir_Substance 12y ago
    But consider: Your house is constantly saturated with radio waves from TV stations, radio stations, wifi etc. What if I were to design a device that passively received reflections of these signals rather then generating it's own to achieve the same function as the device in this post. So I now have the same result, but I am "merely" receiving reflections, rather then making my own. There is no difference in the function, this is rules lawyering at its best. I am willing to let police observe emissions on visible wavelengths ONLY because that is a slippery slope to not being allowed to look into windows. Anything you need a device to view is not ok to view without a warrant, no matter the technique.
    - zaroth 12y ago
      If you look at Gizmo's quotes, I think it's pretty clear they considered these kinds of technology tricks in deciding Kyllo, and 'taking the long view' that high tech collection of passively emitted information requires a warrant. I think the general approach is it's the result that matters, not the specific approach, e.g. 'expectation of privacy'.
gizmo686 12y ago
Kyllo v. United States [1] Law enforcement used a thermal imaging camera to detect hotspots consistent with marijuana growth inside Kyllo's house. In a 5-4 decision, the Supreme Court ruled that this was a 4th amendment violation. [1]http://www.oyez.org/cases/2000-2009/2000/2000_99_8508 http://www.oyez.org/cases/2000-2009/2000/2000_99_8508
- baddox 12y ago
  That's pretty close. I could see it going the other way just as easily.
  - andymcsherry 12y ago
    I would argue the opposite. The dissenting opinion's rationale doesn't hold up in this case > Heat waves, like aromas that are generated in a kitchen, or in a laboratory or opium den, enter the public domain if and when they leave a building. In the case of thermal imaging, you measure light waves that is already leaving the building. In the case of radar, you are actively sending in light waves to bounce off the inside and return to you.
    - baddox 12y ago
      That's certainly true using that reasoning (which, incidentally, I think is ridiculous). Of course, they could come up with a workaround. Like perhaps it's not a violation of property rights for invisible and virtually harmless waves to enter private property, and if they happen to bounce off something and come back to the source for collection and analysis, so be it.
      - gizmo686 12y ago
        It is most certainly not a violation of property rights; radio waves are a notable exemption to normal property rights. Not to mention the fact that their are many other radio waves that already enter your private property. They still would need to argue that it is not a 4th amendment violation.
honeybooboo123 12y ago
One's home is, demonstrably, not sacrosanct anymore. Welcome to the United Soviet States of America. This (too?) will sound like hyperbole, but.. get out while you can. Look, the staggering insanity of North-Korea has lasted for more than half a fucking century. Would you like to spend the rest of your life in North-Korea? What about an equivalent America?
bsder 12y ago
Parallel construction. Once they know what they need to, then they'll make up a "legal" construction for how they got that information.

femto 12y ago

Does the US use "sarking" [1] (metal foil insulation) in house construction? Most Australian houses are wrapped in a layer of metal foil insulation. Presumably that would offer some attenuation to radar, though the windows must still allow radiation though, as mobile phones typically work inside. Perhaps a house with metal foil based window tinting would offer a reasonably complete Faraday cage? [1] http://www.bradfordinsulation.com.au/Products/Residential/Thermal-insulation/EnviroSeal-roof-sarking.aspx http://www.bradfordinsulation.com.au/Products/Residential/Th...

jzwinck 12y ago
People use a lot of different construction materials and techniques across the country, but I don't think this "sarking" is common for residences. People don't want to live inside Faraday cages though, for the reason you already mentioned: their mobile phones wouldn't work. Not to mention broadcast television, AM/FM radio, garage door openers, etc.
- comrh 12y ago
  I've thought about living in one, I only use radio in the car and TV comes in through cables. On the plus side my wifi would be protected from wardriving (or an outside access) as it would never leave the house. Cell service would definitely be a problem though.
  - _cudgel 12y ago
    While this is admittedly off-topic to this thread, I too have given this some thought. I'm coming around to the opinion that losing cell service wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing. I prefer to live in a rural area, and a landline would definitely be cheaper. Ditching the smartphone in favor of a feature phone, which could remain off, battery disconnected, and in it's own little faraday cage in the car -- because being prepared for an emergency is a thing we should all do -- well, it all seems very appealing. Nothing in my pocket, no wifi sniffer gathering the hardware address off my phone, no location tracking services, etc. Best of all, the people in my life would adjust to me not being available 24x7x365. I think that would be highly beneficial when compared to the constant stream of interruptions that seem like an invasion of privacy all on their own.

jonahx 12y ago

As disturbing as the police use is, I am more disturbed by the possibility (inevitability?) of devices like these, and similar audio devices, becoming so cheap and readily available that even basic privacy from strangers while in your home becomes a thing of the past. It seems to me that before too long anyone could pick up audio and video devices for a couple hundred bucks that would allow them to see you in your own house and hear your every word.

themodelplumber 12y ago
What if you could get a discount on e.g. your insurance payments for a similar device, permanently mounted on the outside of your residence, and readable on location by law enforcement or other responders (like rescue)? Would you be OK with other people taking the deal?
- rubencodes 12y ago
  Seems like the type of thing Big Brother would do to make it more palatable. Personally, no, I would never do sacrifice my privacy for whatever amount they'd give you. But I guess that choice is up to each individual, really.
clavalle 12y ago
There has to be some equally cheap countermeasures that can be found.
- foobarqux 12y ago
  It's called metal.
  - sologoub 12y ago
    Can you elaborate?
    - pmalynin 12y ago

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

dhughes 12y ago

What if it's passive? Wifi from the routers of homes emit the RF energy and all the police do is use a detector I could see that as legal since it's energy being emitted just as if it were light shining out a window and you were a silhouette. http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/133936-using-wifi-to-see-through-walls http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/133936-using-wifi-to-see-... >The system, devised by Karl Woodbridge and Kevin Chetty, requires two antennae and a signal processing unit (i.e. computer), and is no larger than a suitcase. Unlike normal radar, which emits radio waves and then measures any reflected signals, this new system operates in complete stealth.

pithon 12y ago
I wouldn't consider the passive/active distinction the definition for 'invasive.' I'd consider thermal imaging from the outside of the home w/out a warrant 'invasive', but a thermal camera is just picking up the heat radiated by your body.
- dalke 12y ago
  The article links to the relevant Supreme Court decision. They, in "Kyllo v. United States, 533 U.S. 27 (2001), held that the use of a thermal imaging, or FLIR, device from a public vantage point to monitor the radiation of heat from a person's home was a "search" within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment, and thus required a warrant." -http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyllo_v._United_States http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyllo_v._United_States The article goes on to say the Supreme Court "specifically noted that the rule would apply to radar-based systems that were then being developed."
  - scott_karana 12y ago
    Thank god for that.
ObviousScience 12y ago
There's already precedent about this involving radiated IR, which ruled that police may not use such tools without a warrant, as it violates what people normally consider to be private information. It's possible that different rulings will come in the future, but you have people defending drug dealers to thank for essentially ruling that this requires a warrant at present.

funkdobiest 12y ago

So does using these new devices mean they will be using the flash bangs less? They should be able to see who all is inside and realize a child or person that is not the suspect?

pavel_lishin 12y ago
It doesn't sound like it can positively identify people; just pinpoint where they are in the house.
- ssully 12y ago
  It could help determine if there are infants or children in the house before a raid. Then again it really isn't hard to determine if there are children in a house without advanced tech...
aptwebapps 12y ago
This is actually a good point. Under current law they aren't going to be able to use one to gather evidence without a warrant, but if they already have a warrant it might make raids safer. Assuming the tech is any good, that is.
GFK_of_xmaspast 12y ago
Of course not, they can't tell the race of the inhabitant.
peteretep 12y ago
Exactly. As long as they can get usage under control by making them warrant only, sounds like a good way to start demilitarising the police. Hard to justify going all SWAT if you can see a house contains only two unarmed people in bed.

curiously 12y ago

the transition to a surveillance policing state is nearly complete.

pavel_lishin 12y ago

That story links to https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/1505137-12-6001.html https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/1505137-12-6001.html when talking about a court upholding Denson's conviction, which mentions nothing about using radar to search a house.

bitchypat 12y ago
I found it here: http://www.ca10.uscourts.gov/opinions/13/13-3329.pdf http://www.ca10.uscourts.gov/opinions/13/13-3329.pdf

deleted 12y ago

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ftcHn 12y ago

Any examples of the display output of the radar device?

Puts 12y ago
Manual: http://www.range-r.com/documents/RANGER.PDF http://www.range-r.com/documents/RANGER.PDF
ynasser 12y ago
It only tells you if there are people inside, either moving or breathing, and how far away they are. There's only text output, no actual images. --------- From the manual: "RANGE-R is designed for simple one-handed operation. Holding RANGE-R to a wall, door or other building structure, the operator simultaneously presses buttons on the sensor’s two sides to begin the analysis. Within three seconds, the system returns a range-to-target result as well as the status of the target, which is indicated as either a mover (Mov) or a breather (Br). The result is displayed to the user in terms of distance in feet to the target on the unit’s LCD. RANGE-R is also capable of detecting and displaying the range of multiple targets. In such cases, the display will alternate through the different ranges of the targets."
madethemcry 12y ago
The posted pdf to the manual shows a little bit of the device. But here's another larger and more advanced device (linked in the article). It is doing the same but with an more elaborated output visualization. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bt3ecnqdUCo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bt3ecnqdUCo You can clearly see the output in the video.
- stickfigure 12y ago
  My mind immediately screamed "game over man, game over!" and reached for the flamethrower.

finid 12y ago

> and similar audio devices, becoming so cheap and readily available that even basic privacy from strangers while in your home becomes a thing of the past. Even at current price ($6000), the thing is cheap, taking into account what it can do. As for privacy, forget about that, at least privacy by default. that's so dead. Start thinking about counter measures.

robmiller 12y ago

My first reaction is that Anne Frank's diary would have been much shorter had this technology existed then.

frankzander 12y ago
+1
onion2k 12y ago
The problem with that line of thinking is that you're really arguing that an entire technology is 'uninvented' because it could be used for evil. Suggesting that we ought to give up doppler radar entirely, with all its benefits like detecting victims in natural disasters, finding people trapped in fires, detecting criminal suspects, etc because it might be used by the next evil dictator is ridiculous. It's a completely unmeasured response. Besides being impossible to uninvent things, it just means we lose out on potentially useful technology now for an intangible benefit that might never come to pass. The fact that the next evil dictator could have access to tools like this is reason to be vigilant not to let an evil dictator come to power and to be sensible about how we use these tools today to stop them being used in ways we think are unreasonable. It is not a reason to suggest we shouldn't have the tools.
- stickfigure 12y ago
  Sometimes HN is a joy because you can upvote both the insightful criticism and the eloquent rebuttal.
- patal 12y ago
  That's absolutely not what parent was arguing, though. Also, that "line of thinking" not necessarily leads there. Accepting the technology is but one step. But we still need to raise moral and ethic questions about it. All parent was really saying is, that the nazis wouldn't have thought twice about using said technology to kill even more people.
  - onion2k 12y ago

Animats 12y ago

That device is more useful for firefighters than for cops. Firefighters need to find people inside burning buildings. Looking for trapped people is one of the more dangerous jobs in firefighting. The fact that it's being sold more to cops than firefighters indicates that cops are getting too much money for tactical gear. The device is a fairly basic Doppler radar, although the sensitivity is impressive. Someone might want to look up the FCC approval data for it to get the full technical specs.

throwawayranger 12y ago
L-3 Communications RANGE-R Operator's Manual http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-1.pdf http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-1.pdf Internal Photos http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-2.pdf http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-2.pdf External Photos http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-3.pdf http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-3.pdf Test Report http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-5.pdf http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-5.pdf Handheld Radar Frequency Scanner for Concealed Object Detection U.S. Patent 6,950,054 http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/US6950054.pdf http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/US6950054.pdf
crypt1d 12y ago
would the huge increase in heat in such burning buildings hinder the usability of a Doppler radar? I would guess so, as different temperature should mean different speed of sound.
- A1kmm 12y ago
  It is a radar device so the speed of sound is irrelevant. The speed of light in air (and hence the refractive index) does depend slightly on temperature / pressure, but not by very much: https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/6872/refractive-index-of-air-in-dependence-of-temperature https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/6872/refractive-...
tzs 12y ago
> Someone might want to look up the FCC approval data for it to get the full technical specs Someone using a new account named throwawayranger did that and posted the results, but the comment was promptly killed because it was a new account posting via TOR. For those without "showdead" enabled, here is the content of the dead post: ---------------------- L-3 Communications RANGE-R Operator's Manual http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-1.pdf http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-1.pdf Internal Photos http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-2.pdf http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-2.pdf External Photos http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-3.pdf http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-3.pdf Test Report http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-5.pdf http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/RANGE-R-5.pdf Handheld Radar Frequency Scanner for Concealed Object Detection U.S. Patent 6,950,054 http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/US6950054.pdf http://blockyourid.com/~gbpprorg/mil/wall/US6950054.pdf

jacquesm 12y ago

What are the power levels this thing emits?

sandworm 12y ago

It's radar. So it is emitting radio waves, with a tiny tiny percent of them bouncing back to the detector. So it can be detected and/or jammed. Assuming these devices work on a very narrow frequency range, it shouldn't be too hard to passively hear them coming. If detectors appear, these devices would become a serious liability for anyone looking to "storm" a residence.

nzealand 12y ago

The Range-r simply tells users how far away movement is occurring in a building. Useful for a no nock entry, but not much more. The bigger issue is the number of tactical police raids on private homes, plus some of the other technologies in development and currently available. Stingray, which is currently in use, acts as a portable cell tower. All cell phone calls in the vicinity of a stingray unit get routed through the mobile cell tower, warrant or not.

Luyt 12y ago

This quote from the article made me think immediately of the 'motion trackers' as used in the Aliens films, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1yNOT6lWedA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1yNOT6lWedA "The radars work like finely tuned motion detectors, using radio waves to zero in on movements as slight as human breathing from a distance of more than 50 feet. They can detect whether anyone is inside of a house, where they are and whether they are moving."

logfromblammo 12y ago
For the speculative future sake of humanity, if you ever work on the GUI for one of those things, make sure it has an elevation indicator. More than 1m below the detector, show a downward-pointing triangle. More than 1m above it, show an upward-pointing triangle. Within 1m, show a square. Change the relative size of the icon according to the size of the moving object. Add telltale lines extending from the center of the icon in a contrast color to show direction of motion and speed. I realize that the shortcomings of the device UI were critical to the dramatic tension, but whenever I see that scene in Aliens, I can't help but sympathetically think about the poor military-industrial-complex gadget developer who wasn't even allowed to think about the user experience, because the requirements were determined by someone who would likely never use it, and cast in concrete long before anyone was hired to implement them. And the thing that really kills me is that the person who created those requirements probably based them on a device seen in a sci-fi movie. This is why it is so important for film directors to employ technical consultants whenever they include gadgets and computer monitors. Anything seen on the big screen will have an ongoing and possibly unintended future influence on design.

lotsofmangos 12y ago

That's nothing, wait till they get hold of an ADR scanner, it can chemically identify everything it scans and can do it through miles of rock. In interview, Colin Stove is quoted as referring to it jokingly as a "quadcorder", on the basis that it is much better than a tricorder - http://adrokgroup.com/technology/how-it-works http://adrokgroup.com/technology/how-it-works

kozlinov 12y ago

Privacy? Fuck privacy! The 21st century attitude. People, seriously, we need to do something about it until it is too late.

hawleyal 12y ago
I think it's not "fuck privacy", but merely realizing there wasn't really privacy to begin with. More like "privacy is an illusion".
deleted 12y ago
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tempodox 12y ago

Yikes, that site makes noise shortly after opening it. Fank you very much, will never visit again.