The Port of Oakland was the driver for this because it is critical infrastructure and was awarded funds by the federal government to secure itself. I'm not sure that's controversial. I'm also reminded of the sniper that fired on the PG&E power distribution apparatus south of San Jose and the investment that followed.
Monitoring the movements of people in an area as large as the Port of Oakland is actually correct surveillance. Think about it. If you were going to destroy the port or use it to further other goals, the first thing you'd do is turn or plant an authorized person. Literally step 1. You also need to watch merchant crews and activity near the port; surveillance is actually really hard, from experience, and I don't like seeing people think they know what's best like this and opining accordingly. There are valid uses for very strong surveillance even beyond containers here.
That it grew to the city is indeed interesting and concerning and worthy of discussion, but casino surveillance would absolutely blow your mind if you think you have a handle on infrastructure security. The type of stuff people are (probably correctly) resisting in broader Oakland are actually exactly what you want for securing a port, datacenter, military base, and so on.
Bringing the point back to the Hacker News crowd: if it's easy for you to enter your datacenter, shop for a new datacenter. I appreciate vehicle barricades having to be lowered once I present biometrics to enter a datacenter, and you should too. Facial recognition to go on the floor is not unheard of. You should want that. Same reason you should want strong surveillance on a port.
Monitoring the movements of people in an area as large as the Port of Oakland is actually correct surveillance. Think about it. If you were going to destroy the port or use it to further other goals, the first thing you'd do is turn or plant an authorized person. Literally step 1. You also need to watch merchant crews and activity near the port; surveillance is actually really hard, from experience, and I don't like seeing people think they know what's best like this and opining accordingly. There are valid uses for very strong surveillance even beyond containers here.
That it grew to the city is indeed interesting and concerning and worthy of discussion, but casino surveillance would absolutely blow your mind if you think you have a handle on infrastructure security. The type of stuff people are (probably correctly) resisting in broader Oakland are actually exactly what you want for securing a port, datacenter, military base, and so on.
Bringing the point back to the Hacker News crowd: if it's easy for you to enter your datacenter, shop for a new datacenter. I appreciate vehicle barricades having to be lowered once I present biometrics to enter a datacenter, and you should too. Facial recognition to go on the floor is not unheard of. You should want that. Same reason you should want strong surveillance on a port.