Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!rutgers!iuvax!silver!commgrp
From: commgrp@silver.bacs.indiana.edu (BACS Data Communications Group)
Newsgroups: sci.electronics
Subject: Re: Robocop
Message-ID: <954@silver.bacs.indiana.edu>
Date: 19 Feb 88 14:31:23 GMT
Sender: commgrp@silver.bacs.indiana.edu
Lines: 53


 
"Robocop" in the movie was a good guy; electronic license-readers are 
more reminiscent of "The Terminator."  What next, bar-code tattoos?  
Federally-specified machine-readable plates?

A previous poster believes that laser safety standards will prohibit 
police LIDAR. Laser bar-code scanners are ubiquitous in grocery 
stores; the beam is safe as long as it moves fast. 

Doppler radar can, of course, get you coming or going.  Indiana, 
Kentucky and a few other states have no front license plates.  In 
Indiana you may put anything on the front, including expired plates 
from IN or other states (being careful, of course, to stay out of said 
other states).  ALL states require valid plates on the rear.

As the Vietnam war demonstrated, low-tech can defeat high-tech.  A 
little strategically-placed dirt or dirt/paint mixture on the license 
plate, that could have been put there by your kids playing in mud, 
should fool the "Robocop" easily.

Rather than a James Bond rotary license plate, how about a frame with 
transparent LCD which subtly makes 7's look like 1's, etc.

Another possible countermeasure:  An IR license-plate illuminator 
(quartz-halogen lamp with IR filter) could overexpose the Robocop's 
film with no visible indication, if strong enough to exceed the range 
of the RC's automatic exposure control.

If a real escalation of Civilian Electronic Warfare (I love that term) 
becomes necessary, the physics of radar ECM tend to favor the jammer.  
Technical competence is real power, a fact seldom appreciated by 
political technogeeks.  The beauty of EW is that the mark may not 
realize he's been deliberately zapped!

Paranoia:  Of course, the originator of all this Robocop discussion 
might be an employee of the manufacturer, a vile gofer of Big Brother 
assigned to collect information on possible countermeasures.

As usual, our electronic news network is ahead of the magazines.  My 
subscription copy of POPULAR COMMUNICATIONS (March 1988) arrived 
Monday.  The monthly column on police radar discusses the new 
photographic units, and includes a few points which haven't been made 
here.  It should hit the newsstands soon.


          Remember that you computer programmers, more
          than anyone else, make Big Brother possible.
--

Frank     W9MKV @ WA8YVR
reid@gold.bacs.indiana.edu
reid@iubacs.bitnet