Police auditing videos

[The Lurker]

I've ended up going down a YouTube rabbit hole and stumbled across police auditing videos. Has anyone seen these before? Well, presumably some people have as they have hundreds and thousands of hits.

The main guy seems to be Auditing Britain. Racks up a shit load of hits and is loved in the comments. To be honest though, I don't understand what he's getting out of it. He travels very far for these videos which is a lot of time, effort and money just to get a reaction off a few police officers. So if anyone could explain it to me, that would be great.

Yer man Auditing Britain even walks past my old office in one of his videos. He didn't barge in there though which is just as well because it's not a police station and it was difficult enough to get in with a work pass, let alone without one.

[Fambo Number Mive]

I've seen a few from various Youtubers, there are also lots of videos where people "audit" covid sites. Are some of them covid deniers hoping to "expose" something?

In America, there are some videos where people go in and film inside post offices. I get they have the right to do that but I'd rather not be filmed and put on Youtube visiting the post office. Thankfully I don't think people have the right to film inside post offices here.

[Johnny Textface]

... Racks up a shit load of hits and is loved in the comments.

... I don't understand what he's getting out of it.

You don't?

I watch them while I'm eating my tea sometimes. The main point he is making is that photography is not a crime. If you're on public land you have the right to photograph whatever you can see with your eyeballs. The police, however, do not always seem wise to this which makes them genuinely entertaining (to me at least).

It also occasionally highlights how quick the police are to search someone under the terrorism act in order to get their details. He has won alot of compensation claims for this I believe.

[Icehaven]

Even if there was any point to this other than self important prigs trying to pretend they have some power and enjoy pissing people off surely they realise, and would themselves suspect, that if there was anything nefarious going on wherever they're "auditing" it sure as shit wouldn't happen in front of their camera.

What are the American post office ones hoping to catch, a bunch of Newmans throwing the mail into bins?

[TheGingerAlien]

These police auditors always come across as absolute maniacs...  Same with the cyclists who go around harassing motorists.  Vigilante mindset.  No surprise it's a hit on social media cos conflict is king. 

tl;dr: aye seen them, they're all loons

[imitationleather]

These police auditors always come across as absolute maniacs...  Same with the cyclists who go around harassing motorists.  Vigilante mindset.  No surprise it's a hit on social media cos conflict is king. 

tl;dr: aye seen them, they're all loons

Add nonce hunters to this list as well.

[TheGingerAlien]

[Fambo Number Mive]

Even if there was any point to this other than self important prigs trying to pretend they have some power and enjoy pissing people off surely they realise, and would themselves suspect, that if there was anything nefarious going on wherever they're "auditing" it sure as shit wouldn't happen in front of their camera.

What are the American post office ones hoping to catch, a bunch of Newmans throwing the mail into bins?

I think with the American post office videos they are hoping to be told by staff and or customers not to film so they can tell them they have the right to. They see themselves as defending the right to film inside government buildings.

[willbo]

yeah...they're more "bad capitol hill rioters" than "good BLM rioters" on the cop hater scale

[Consignia]

Yeah, I made a topic about one a few months ago: https://www.cookdandbombd.co.uk/forums/index.php?topic=85588.msg4485112#msg4485112 He goes by the name GM Media now, after trying to model himself as a proper journalist for a bit. Now he's more into aggressively auditing private companies, harassing security guards and ordinary workers and trespassing.

[Gurke and Hare]

Yeah, why cant he just leave the police to get on with their bullshit in peace?

[Better Midlands]

To be honest though, I don't understand what he's getting out of it.

££££

I saw somewhere koleeberks is making about £4k a month on his.

Long Island Audit is pretty good, he's very polite the whole way through and can get some interesting reactions. This one is interesting because it gets in depth with the local law.

Audit The Audit goes deep analysing other peoples audits/films and pulls up the actual laws and legal precedents to show where the police are acting in/correctly.

https://youtube.com/c/AuditTheAudit

It's next generation reality TV really, interesting because it's not scripted.

[Better Midlands]

It also occasionally highlights how quick the police are to search someone under the terrorism act in order to get their details.

Shocking how often they misuse section 43 for basically a stop and search, although you don't need to provide an ID or your name in this case.

[shoulders]

Yeah, why cant he just leave the police to get on with their bullshit in peace?

Yeah it's either one extreme or the other, right?

[Paul Calf]

There's a really scummy sub-genre of this that's basically a load of unemployable Sov Cit dickheads harassing postal workers, medical staff and volunteers at needle exchanges and clinics, waiting for the police to come and winding them up until they get arrested.

There's another sub-genre of authoritarian cock-ends* who play back these videos sneering at them and getting all stiff when someone gets their car window broken and dragged out or gets tazed.

It's fucking exhausting. The internet needs to be broken up and turned into calculators.


*van Balion, Schroedinger's Cat etc...

[Gurke and Hare]

Yeah it's either one extreme or the other, right?

Perhaps I'm biased because of where I live, but the Met are basically a criminal gang at this point. And even if they weren't, someone watching them while they work shouldn't be an issue.

[Johnny Textface]

And even if they weren't, someone watching them while they work shouldn't be an issue.

Sometimes you get the occasional Fire Brigade "audit". A stark contrast in attitude towards people wanting to have nose about.

[The Ombudsman]

I watch Audit the Audit too and find it quite interesting. They seem to be generally fair in their assessment and will slate the auditor for being totally misinformed etc. as much as the coppers.

On a sort of related note, I watched a few videos recently of some chap trying to use those 'special' Royal Mint coins, you know the sort, £10 commemorative coin to mark the Queens whatever in shops. He maintains (I think correctly) that it's legal tender. He's had the filth called many times on him. I don't quite get it but some of the bewildered cops are a delight to watch.

[Gurke and Hare]

They are legal tender, but that doesn't mean shops are obliged to accept them. He's not committing a crime by trying to use them though, so I'm not sure why anybody would be calling the police on him. The police are dicks, but it's no wonder they seem bewildered at people getting them involved in this.

[The Ombudsman]

They are legal tender, but that doesn't mean shops are obliged to accept them. He's not committing a crime by trying to use them though, so I'm not sure why anybody would be calling the police on him. The police are dicks, but it's no wonder they seem bewildered at people getting them involved in this.

That's about the size of it. If I recall, that was his only payment method and he was paying for diesel, so he had a full tank and no means to pay (by the retailers standards).

I guess it's a sort of hobby...

[gilbertharding]

They are legal tender, but that doesn't mean shops are obliged to accept them. He's not committing a crime by trying to use them though, so I'm not sure why anybody would be calling the police on him. The police are dicks, but it's no wonder they seem bewildered at people getting them involved in this.

I haven't watched the videos, but my guess would be that no - he's not committing a crime in trying to use them, but he probably is making a nuisance of himself, causing a disturbance, etc etc. They're probably calling the police to see if they can help to get this fucking whopper out of their shop.

[Uncle TechTip]

The power of the hyphen - I thought this was about someone's run in with the law over a porn collection.

[Sebastian Cobb]

It sounds like the civilian version of flying your planes at the boundary of your adversaries airspace to wind them up.

[Alberon]

I watch them while I'm eating my tea sometimes. The main point he is making is that photography is not a crime. If you're on public land you have the right to photograph whatever you can see with your eyeballs. The police, however, do not always seem wise to this which makes them genuinely entertaining (to me at least).

Last year someone tried this at the COVID testing centre at the university I work at. He was made to leave pretty quickly when it was pointed out university land is not public.

[Gurke and Hare]

I haven't watched the videos, but my guess would be that no - he's not committing a crime in trying to use them, but he probably is making a nuisance of himself, causing a disturbance, etc etc. They're probably calling the police to see if they can help to get this fucking whopper out of their shop.

If he's trying to pay for petrol with a £10 coin, I'd bet that the police are being called on the incorrect basis that he's trying to steal it.

[Consignia]

Last year someone tried this at the COVID testing centre at the university I work at. He was made to leave pretty quickly when it was pointed out university land is not public.

Oh, they usually deploy the "public accessible" argument then. Until asked to stop filming and leave, they aren't tresspassing, and it's fair game if there's no physical barriers. They can be pretty tenacious on the finer details of trespass laws.

[Zetetic]

He was made to leave pretty quickly when it was pointed out university land is not public.

The fundamental premise doesn't make any sense. Most hospitals in the UK are on publicly-owned land. They're operated for the public, and in a lot of them any member of the public can wander in without being challenged.

It'll still be possible for operating organisations to withdraw any implied right of access, and unlikely that you wouldn't run afoul of issues around handling special category data if you did take any photographs (as in you couldn't cite "Made public by the data subject").

[gilbertharding]

Are a lot of these people trying to apply American ideas about privacy and freedom to this country?

I mean - it's occurred to me, reading Z's reply, that a hospital might be a public space, but it's full of private individuals, many of whom will not be in the mood to be filmed (to put it mildly).

There *is* a problem of officious jobsworths picking on innocent people taking photos of legitimate public spaces (and, increasingly, quasi-public ones, like shopping malls and places which look like streets but aren't) which I don't think is going to be alleviated by absolute PRICKS insisting on their 'right' to barge into people's workplaces and insist on filming because they've misunderstood the meaning of the phrase 'public sector'.

[Fambo Number Mive]

I imagine the actions of these people will make it easier for any bill criminalising photography/filming in a public place to become law. Filming the police is one thing, but filming outside covid testing centres, in council offices and in hospitals will (rightly) alienate a lot of the public.

I think filming/photographing in a public place must remain legal but I can imagine this government or Starmer's Labour would love to limit it.

[Uncle TechTip]

Filming is one thing but there must be data protection concerns around broadcasting it which I imagine that uploading to YouTube amounts to. Do these videos blur the face of anyone who hasn't given consent? Which is everyone.