UPDATE (2/11/15): Hundreds of Cops Download Waze App to Fill it With False Information

In a desperate move, cops have now decided to attack technological progress itself.

Hundreds of cops in Miami have been entering inaccurate data into the Waze app to mislead users, trolling the app to cause confusion and inconvenience.

Evidently they think that by doing this, they can cause people to stop trusting (and therefore stop using) the app.

Cops seem to forget that they are vastly outnumbered, however, and a sea of accurate reputation-based reports could easily dwarf their trolling.

It’s Cop Logic 101: try to attack that which you don’t understand, and always fail.

It’s just like when angry cops decided to go “on strike” in New York City, but ended up demonstrating (i) that they are essentially armed revenue-generators for the State and (ii) that society would be much better off without most of their services. And one might also add (iii) that cops seem to have distressingly low IQs.

Tech Dirt explains how their attack on Waze is futile:

Of course the very nature of crowd-sourced apps like this involves repeated false reports and unreliable users being weeded out not only by the system itself, but by more trustworthy reports from reliable Waze users with higher scores. Even if this dumb idea worked, and all Miami Waze users were confused into thinking speed traps were everywhere, wouldn’t they drive slower and ruin revenue generation (what this is really about) anyway?

All the Miami police force is doing is wasting time and taxpayer money in a war on perfectly legal conversation.

Continue reading below to get the full details. >>>

2015/01/26

WASHINGTON — Google, Inc. has become the next target of cops.

Google purchased a feature for its traffic program called Waze.

Waze has been around since 2013, but many users have recommended it for a reliable way to track the location of police officers in their city.

There are over 50 million Waze users who can coordinate with each other to send out warnings about the locations of speed traps, traffic cameras, and police officers, along with more innocuous things like heavy traffic zones and construction zones.

But the cops will have none of it.

They claim that it puts them in danger because people can use Waze to stalk them, and they’re planning to fight Google until the app is disabled.

As reported by the AP:

Waze users mark police presence on maps without much distinction other than “visible” or “hidden.” Users see a police icon, but it’s not immediately clear whether police are there for a speed trap, a sobriety check or a lunch break. The police generally are operating in public spaces.

A Waze spokeswoman, Julie Mossler, said the company thinks deeply about safety and security. She said Waze works with the New York Police Department and others around the world by sharing information. Google declined to comment.

“These relationships keep citizens safe, promote faster emergency response and help alleviate traffic congestion,” Mossler said.

Police are fond of telling people that “If you haven’t done anything wrong, then you have nothing worry about.”

This slogan would apply with even greater logical force to police themselves.

They are the ones roaming around public streets with loaded pistols, they are the organization that is notorious for having obscenely concentrated levels of violence and abuse — it only makes sense that citizens should begin monitoring them.

If they have no misconduct and corruption to hide, then they have nothing to worry about.