You may not be aware of this, but Google has a smart phone ap that gives citizens the approximate location of police officers in the field. Now, some are saying that the ap could be used to plan ambush murders of on duty police officers.
The ap was meant to help motorists evade road traps set up by police trying to catch speeders and other traffic violators. But some say it could also gives cop killers a heads up on where to target officers.In fact, they say it already has and Google won’t even talk to officials about the ap.
For the fifth year in a row in 2014, ambush attacks on police officers were the No. 1 cause of felonious deaths of law enforcement officers in the line of duty. Nevertheless, Google continues to market a smartphone application that lets lawbreakers pinpoint the location of police officers in the field. Google’s executives won’t even discuss the subject with organizations representing law enforcement.
Google’s popular real-time traffic app, Waze, uses GPS navigation and crowdsourcing to alert users to traffic jams, automobile accidents, stalled cars, and through its “traffic cop” feature, the presence of law enforcement.
Most people undoubtedly use Waze’s police-finding feature to avoid traffic tickets, but the app poses an enormous risk to deputies and police officers.
In the days before he assassinated New York police officers Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu at point blank range while they sat in their patrol car last December, Ismaaiyl Brinsley is known to have used the Waze application to monitor the movements of police officers. The killer identified the location of police on his own Waze account and even posted screen captures to Instagram.
So, what do you think? Is the cop finder ap harmless? Or is it a danger to police? Tell us in the comments.