A new user seemed to join and just removed a ton of mass surveillance devices, mostly license plate readers. I reached out and asked for the source, and reached out to the original user that added them. Both did not respond.
Besides using non-authorized street imagery as proof they exist, I don’t have any other source.
I was wondering what is the common action taken here? I’d hate to think someone can just censor the location of mass surveillance devices with no source. But it’s hard to figure anything out when no one responds. Maybe someone from Fort Lauderdale can take a look and spot check a few locations?
From a sample of the elements and their changesets, maybe they’re removing them because there is no source=* tag on the object or on the changesets that added them?
Well like I said, I’m not the user that added them, just the user that saw they were being removed.
And they were definitely there in late 2024 and early 2025, but again that is based off of “unauthorized street imagery”, you can check your self. BUT I can’t cite that as a source in OSM. So again, that’s why I was hoping someone from the area could check!
If the user deleting them cannot explain how they verified that they do not exist AND there is no serious doubt about edits that added them, I would revert it.
Unless they explain why they removed it.
Note that pedro cabon is a brand new account that joined and suddenly started deleting things.
what is your basis for claiming they do not exist?
If person deleting them has a reason to suspect that they do not exist but you are unsure you should ask person who added them, open a note or create a thread on forums.
Unless there are very strong reasons to suspect it, for example someone was adding fake one or admitted to adding fake data.
Well once the user “pedro cabon” was notified they seemed to just delete their profile… yup pretty suspicious imo.
You still can see their change sets in osmcha: (they had 6 changes, not sure why osmcha only shows 5)
Their 6 changesets:
165555981, 165556700, 165557223, 165557326, 165557520, 165563548
I think new users that come in and removed data from the map without explaining themselves then delete their profiles should have their changesets reverted.
I treat deleting account in such cases as agreeing that their edits were malicious vandalism that should be reverted ASAP
Yes, it is not always case of a vandalism - and sometimes accounts are deleted for other reasons. And not all edits by deleted accounts should be reverted.
Thanks for looking into this and reverting. Last piece of relevant information, just this morning the original user that added them got back to me and said “The ALPRs are all still there. Those changesets were vandalism. Source: Visual observation”.
As it hasn’t come up in the discussion, I took a look at some of the license plate readers that were touched and feel I must raise my suspicions that this vandalism may have been committed by a law enforcement officer, who didn’t appreciate a traffic enforcement tool being potentially avoidable by civilians. It may be worth doing IP analysis to see if the edits came from a government facility.