New smart phone app allows you to snitch anonymously direct to police. Orwellian?

Well, straight from the horses mouth. "Crimestoppers," a local police tip hotline has just gone digital...and mobile. This new service is treading dangerous waters in my opinion and I am a bit worried about the results it will have. If people use it to help apprehend extremely dangerous criminals, great! My fear is that this will turn into another tool allowing for our prisons to become even more overpopulated by means of "brotherly" snitching.

I'm not a fear-monger and I'm certainly not shouting "New World Order" here, but even with all rationality and discernment applied, isn't this getting a little too Orwellian to swallow? Your thoughts on the subject are greatly appreciated.

Source

Excerpt(s):

The new, free app for IPhones and Droids is called "TipSubmit". Here's how it works. Open the app and follow the prompts. Type in the who, what, where, when and why! Everything investigators would need to crack a case. "They can just simply give a location of where that person, or that crime is likely occurring, or at, and it'll plug in the coordinates for you," said Det. Otero.

"We don't know a telephone number. We don't know an email address, or anything the tipster is submitting the tip from," said Detective Otero.

My lord I hope it doesn't get much publicity and gets lost in the app jungle!!!

As an afterthought, I just processed the fact that it has been in operation for a month with no reported results. How do you all feel about accountability with this application. I would at the very least like to see solid numbers on at least a semi-annual basis showing the numbers and types of arrests and successful convictions made using this technology.

reply to post by RickyD


One can only hope, I guess it's a double-edged sword spreading the news.

Be careful where and when and in front of who you are when you pick your nose, cause the nose pickin police will be on your arse in 30 seconds flat.... what have we become ???
Turn me over I am done......

Some of the phone hotlines are already anonymous.
I think these apps may open up a lot of fowl play. To say the person sending in the tip may not like someone and wants to get them into trouble, make up a story or emergency.
How about children with phone access reporting things, they may think is a danger that really isn't...even down to reporting their parents.

reply to post by dreamingawake


You make some very valid points. The child ratting out his or her own parents anonymously through a smart phone app, it doesn't get much more Orwellian than that though. Of course, and overload of rubbish/prank reports could have quite the opposite intended affect and end up being the very death of this thing. Too much wasted time and money on behalf of good old pranksters snitching that they've been robbed by a man named Seymour Wiener.

That's going to be the #1 tool for middle school and high school kids petty squabbles.

Everybody's going to be snitching out their peers for either laughs or revenge.