Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray. It's ready. Are you welcome to Stuff you should know from house Stuff Works dot Com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with me as always is Charles W. Bryant. Now you, Chuck, I'm here, Josh. Oh wait, this isn't the Halloween episode. No, No, that already, that already came out. That was good, though. I appreciate that. Yeah, that was really good. Well, truthfully, it's almost Halloween's I'm just in a spirit, are you? Yeah? In the spirit? Yes, dude, I have been punning lately left and right, and it's just it makes me sick. You have the stomach punkin though? Have you good one, Chuck? That reminds me that we've been We've been talking about this punk and chunking thing pretty hard. Let's do it again, Yeah time, let's we'll say it again. Okay, So the mothership of Discovery Channel has asked us to mention a show that's coming out a special, actually the pair of specials. It's coming out on Thanksgiving night, um on the Science Channel eight p m uh you got there's two shows, Like you said, the Road to punk and checking and punkin checking, punkin chunking itself and again that's that begins at eight p m. Eastern Time, because I believe it takes place in the Town in the East, which is appropriated no on Science Channel. Yeah, so Chuck, yes you want a podcast, Yeah, let's do it. Okay, So, Chuck, have you ever seen Minority Report? I have? Uh, sure, Steven Spielberg and the Yeah, yeah I knew. I knew Tom Cruise is in it. Didn't know Spielberg directed? Yeah, I thought it was okay, it kind of lost me in the third act, didn't, Yeah, big time. You know it's based on Philip K. Dick. Um, I think novel short story wasn't. Yeah, it was called the Minority Report. Oh yeah, that's Hollywood for you. They're always changing things. Yeah. But okay, so you you know, um that it's about a uh I guess, a crime section, anti crime section, law enforcement some people call it um that arrests people based on information given to them by this group of people who have precognition, and that would be the Office of pre Crime. Appropriately, the Cruise was a pre crime officer, right. Um, we have a real dearth of um people with genuine precognition. It's kind of tough to find three that you know, you can really reliably count on who can serve you images from their brain crimes that are about to happen. Yeah. They had a bad off in that movie too, they really did. They were Yeah, um we are. However, it seems like working on a database that will be able to predict crime and if so, humanity is screwed personal rights? Is that what you're getting in. Yeah, there's a lot of problems with this, but yeah, so there's a there's um, there's a database that there's several databases already um around right, there's all kinds of databases, sir. When I was a kid, um, uh, my dad took me to get my fingers printed, uh huh, just in case I was abducted. And I wouldn't talk to him on the way home. I was all, like, you redded me out, dad, just in case you got arrested. Your dad would just afford that, and so here you go, no no ready for him, you know, like it was put into this database. So yeah, ostensibly, so if I ever was kidnapped, and you know, was my brain was washed and I lost my identity. They'd be able to fingerprint me if I ever wandered up onto the to the street and they'd be like, oh, it's Josh Clark. The chances of that are slim to nune. The chances of meet committee a crime, We're talking like near percent. See. I was a kid during the Atlantic child murders, the famous murders Wayne Williams, remember that. So my mom was like, go, you know, go play by done of the Creek. Don't worry about fingerprinting. Yeah, go go get the mail down by the street, get the neighbor's mail, right, get all the name urs mail. Jeez, like you know where your children are? My mom never knew where I was. Yeah, well I survived. Well, yes, clearly you did. But so fingerprinting is just one database, right, Yeah, that's one. Uh, there's another one that's a little more advanced, a little more sophisticated. Um that is called the National Crime Information Center. Right. You ever watched the movie or the show the first forty eight? No, dude, it is good. Um. I sleep with a hammer next to my bed now because of that shows what's the concept there. Within the first two days is when all the evidence is like hot and yeah if they don't, if they don't close a homicide within the first forty eight hours, the chances of them ever closing it dropped dramatically. Yeah. So they sometimes they do, sometimes they don't. But it's a real life, um, real life uh show. Uh. And it follows like real life cops, like on the beat, like after a homicide, and like the stuff that people will do each other's just chilling. My favorite is this ball guy who works in Memphis. He's awesome Squidy It's not Squibby, Um, he's he would bust Squibby though I can tell you that. But um, they're this they they often access on the show, the National Crime Information Center. So it's got like all this information on people who are who have committed crimes. Um. But it's more than just their fingerprints. It could be like their street name that they're they're always using it to look up like somebody's street name. Um. It also has you know, people who are members or suspective members of like gangs organization. Yeah what else? You? Umi has this iPhone app that's disturbing. It's a locate a sex offender. Yeah, I've seen the website. They well they have an iPhone app for it now and like sure enough. There's a lot of sex offenders around our placed. And the weird thing is they aggregate like you'll you'll look at uh several of them and they'll all have the same address except like number six or number thirteen or whatever. So it's clearly an apartment building that's been designated like a sex offender can live here because it's not by a school or anything like that. Remember that article set recently about the they told the ones in Georgia to camp out that they quickly once it hit the news there or you can come back inside. Yeah, we'll find a place for you. Yeah. So okay, so we've got those two databases. There's another one and here's where we start to reach the crux of this podcast finally, after like seventy minutes, the one in England and here, Oh, well you're talking about the National DNA Database. Yeah. Yes, that started in uh England in and initially it was just people who had been uh convicted of crimes that they would get their DNA and keep that on file. Yeah, but that changed, didn't it. It did change, and I think two thousand three they expanded it UM to include anyone who's ever been arrested. So basically, if a cop goes I'm gonna take they can rescue and let you go on the spot. But if the cop can collect a sample right there, if he's got a mobile sample kit, they can take your blood even if you didn't do anything. Yeah, even if they're like, oh sorry, buddy, I had yeah exactly, and you can't say can I get that swab back? And they'll you know, they'll break your arms. And before two thousand six, I think they that that was still most people weren't getting arrested. But that year UM Britain expanded the the list of arrestable offenses, including wearing a seatbelt or more of the point, not wearing it. You're under arrest for wearing a seat bit into this speetree, right, so I mean that's uh yeah, and I imagine that's how they do it too, right as a swab. I don't know about the mobile kits. Probably I can imagine somebody going like, you're not breaking me yeah? So um but but yes, so now in England, if you jay walker, if you are not wearing a seatbelt, they can collect a sample of your DNA that they intend to keep on file indefinitely and four millions strong. Yeah, which makes it the second largest database in the world. DNA database in the world, second second to ours, I would imagine, of course. Uh. That was in two thousand seven, by the way, the four million entries UH that same year. In the US, we have a National DNA Index system in d I S that's maintained by the FBI. UH, and we had four point five million profiles that year. I looked and all I could find where estimates like FBI funding estimates. So these things are probably these numbers are probably high. But for two thousand nine, they estimated that this thing would have fourteen million samples. Now ours isn't just if you're arrested, right, isn't it if if you're a felon? Or does it state? That's how that's how it started out. Um. And then in two thousand and four, California, always on the leading edge of whatever is going on, they passed Prop. Sixty nine controversial it's to say the least. Yeah. Um. Basically, what it says is that law enforcement can take your DNA if you've been arrested for a felony. And some misdemeanors and it's just arrested. Yeah, and illegal immigrants, which they kind of just tossed in there. I'm sure, I'm sure. And let's see, how can we fairly target illegal immigrants? Oh yeah, we'll just take their DNA for no reason. Well there's kids in there too, Yeah, that's that's causing a huge stir is kids are being when they're arrested, they can have their DNA take. I'm sure. So you can imagine that just having your DNA taken, just having a swab stuck in your mouth by a police officer is enough to really raise the ire of some people. Yeah. Obviously a lot of human rights advocates have problems with this, which we'll get into in a second. Unless we're getting into that now. Uh, we can if you want. I mean, yeah, Well, the first thing that kind of got besides the implementation of the program in England, was last year in two thousand and eight, when it was revealed that half a million names in the database are just flat out wrong, and that was that caused a big stir Yeah, either just incorrect or misspelled, it might have been type of but some of them are just wrong. Yeah, that's clearly. I mean just having DNA samples of four and a half four million people in England and then saying oh, and by the way, half a million of them are are wrong. We don't know who's they are. We think they're yours, but they're not. That's a problem. But I mean, is there really a problem with just maintaining a database at d NA? What are they doing with it? Well, it depends because DNA it's not like a fingerprint. There's a lot of information contained in your DNA that's not just identified the person, right, your genetic code, your family history. There's a there's a program called d N a witness made by a company called DNA print Genomics UM, and it can locate ancestry markers and basically say, oh, you found some DNA, we can narrow it down to this person is probably being Hispanic. Well yeah, it's all to deal with racial racial breakdown, right, So I mean, there's racial profiling is about as hot button an issue as anything else, you know, because the problem is, as it stands now, racial profiling is based on past statistics. If you include DNA into the mix, does it become more finely honed or even more egregious, right or does it open itself up? Who knows. Here's the problem with DNA profiling, Chuck. We have not in this country or the UK, from what I can imagine, um, had any real discussion about doing it right we So we've never really come together and said, Okay, do we want a crime free society or as close to a crime free society as we can get. If so, then yes, everybody needs to turn in a DNA sample. If we all agreed that's what we want. If we decide that we would rather live with crime in combating crime under the techniques that we have now to maintain our privacy, then DNA sampling has to stop. DNA profiling has to stop. And the problem is we've never had that conversation either way, right, Well, the public certainly hasn't had so, but it's been continuing along. And then when you talk about the half a million names wrong, it's like, well, you're doing this without our consenter, even asking us, and you're not even doing it right right. The thing is, though they I don't even know, even if they hone this down, can you really prevent crime? I mean, even cops will tell you there's no such thing as preventing crime. Cops go after criminals after they've committed a crime. But unless it's just dumb luck, how many times has a cop come upon a crime before it happens and stopped it? Well that's there. There's there are two different um groups, one in the UK and one in America, which apparently are the two leading trees in DNA profiling for crime prevention. Um that are that that say no, we we do need to do that and we're trying to is that the homicide prevention unit in London think about the name of that homicide prevention unit and they're doing it by forecasting crime. Yeah, well, psychological profiling to which they've done for a while, and that's a little less hinky and invasive than obviously DNA profiling. Right, But what about when you combine the two. Why would you combine DNA with a psychological profile to catch the bad guys? I guess to an extent. But at the same time, what we're talking about is looking at DNA to find out if we can find a genetic defect in somebody that we suggest that maybe they have a short temper, or that they're sociopathic or whatever. If you combine that with a psychological profile. But where does that profile come from? Maybe records from mental health workers, or maybe your insurance records, or your doctor or dental records. I mean, and then doing that now, but who knows what could happen that. That's the point. If this database gets big enough, or I should say, if it gets accurate enough, then yeah, people will probably start getting leaned on to provide information to be contributed to this database for use by law enforce. Yeah. Once you have enough information and you are confident enough that you can prevent a crime, or if you can say this person is probably going to kill somebody, what do they do though? That's what I want to know. Did they just start It's obviously not gonna happen like Minority Report in that film and the story Tom Cruise knocks on your door and says you're under arrest for the future murder of your wife. They're clearly not talking about that. That's impossible in the stuff of science fiction. But what they just monitor someone or tail someone, so basically potentially dangerous people just be under surveillance at all times, I guess so. But what if you've never committed a crime in your entire life and don't intend to. But you've the cops breathing down your neck every night. Anywhere you go, there's a cop following you. You go on a date, there's a cop following you. You take your mother out for dinner, there's a cop following you. I mean, if you've never committed a crime in your life, how fair is that? Well? Right? And plus if someone's tailing you, and I don't know, I could I could see a scenario where some renegade cop um trumps up a traffic violation and pulls you over and shakes you down. And you know, it's not like police. I mean, trust me, I'm not dragging on the police, who do a great job. But there are cases where people are framed and weapons are planted. And if some guy they think is a really bad person waiting to happen, what's to stop a cop from trailing him and doing just that. So, not only that, but what happens if um, somebody gets access to this, if this information in the database is disseminated, and then you've got somebody who's like, well, you know what, I'm going to take it upon myself to rid society of these people. Who may commit a crime. You know, most I can't say most, but there's a lot serial killers out there who, once caught say that they were doing a service to society. Ever seen that. I haven't yet, but I am aware of same scenario. I love six ft under and he dies by the way. Um the the the killer John Wayne Gacy expected that he was going to get a rap on the knuckles because what he'd done is just rid society and some bad kids. That's what he said, Bernie gets I remember, and I guess was that the New York Yeah, he went Charlie Bronson on everyone, and he was the subway vigilantia. He definitely was. But he's a serial killer, is what he is. I thought he I thought he just killed some guys once. Did he kill more than one time? Yeah? I think so wow, I might be wrong. We'll hear from it. But um okay, so yes, there's a possibility of vigilantism. There's a possibility of police harassment. There's also another possibility called well self fulfilling prophecy. Um. Remember we talked about kids getting their DNA taken, Miners getting their DNA taken if they're ever arrested for anything UM. And there's also a push I guess to make to round this database out as much as possible for any kid who has a behavioral problem or maybe gets in trouble at school, for the school to provide information about that kid so that they can say, we're going to keep an eye on you for the rest of your life because you're starting to fit this profile with somebody who might kill somebody later, or maybe he just has a d D or maybe the teacher doesn't like him. Who knows. The problem is is if you know that if you're six and somebody's like, you might kill somebody someday, what is it like to grow up for the next thirty years or so thinking that people assume that you're gonna kill somebody one day? Well they tell you, though I I don't know, there's got to be something that it might not be that explicit. Both children parents are probably notified at the very least, right and if the parents say you're a bad kid, that's why they're watching you, well, why wouldn't the kid go be a bad kid? There's a lot of concern is here right in in the US UM we talked about the homicide prevention unit in the UK. By the way, the senior criminal psychologist Laura Richards has said that her vision is to know who the top one people most potentially violent people in London are at any given time. You know, Squibby's on that list. Sure, and you know when they keep like most wanted lists, gangs especially love getting at the top. And I should probably take the opportunity right here to save our lives. Uh, it's MS thirteen, I understand, not MS twelve. Right. Yeah, we've referred to a gang as MS twelve in the Witness Protection show and it is MS thirteen and we got that wrong. Agreed. Um. Over here in the U S there's a guy named Richard Burke who's the University of Pennsylvania sociologists and statistician. Yeah. I don't mind this one as much. No, it's much much more innocuous. Yeah, well, it's not an invasive because they're not actually taking your DNA or fingerprints. He uh was he a University of Pennsylvania. He's a cry I'm a criminology professor, and he has actually developed an algorithm using thirty different variables from you know, when a kid was young and as they grow up, if they have offenses or if they were abused, and he determines a lethality score, which I don't know, it's it's a little more I can I can accept this in a way I can't too. But at the same time, I was a little well, I'm still put off by the idea of forecasting crime and an effort to prevent it from ever happening. Um. But I did go on and check out some of this guy's stuff and he has another thing UM called crime regimes where he's taking into account see that that lethality score is all uh centered around the individual. And there's a movement of foot where sociology is making a huge move to take crime completely away from psychology. I talked to a sociologists who's like, psychology is completely failed at explaining serial murder. Sociology is time to explain it. Right. So this guy's taking into account like time of day, day of the weak area, UM, like like the location, uh is the drug trade there stable? If so, then there's probably gonna be less crime because there's not gonna be tur force things like that, UM. And even larger stuff needs to be taken into account to like the economic situation that always creates more crimes, but for a group or an area and not an individuals that what you mean. I imagine that this guy will probably eventually try to put both together. So if you've got a lethality score, guy with the lethality score, and he's living in a high risk area, then all of a sudden, the cops might want to go, we should really keep an eye on that guy, you know. So it makes it a little more honed. The problem is is this would probably be eventually compiled with the nd I S here in the States. Yeah, if it turned out to be a pretty good algorithm and it was pretty accurate, I'm sure the government would get their mits on it soon enough. So yeah, and it's not like, um, it's we were talking about health mental health workers being leaned on to to give up information, or doctors disclosing their met records. Insurance companies, UH and Census Information did not know this. I didn't either, which is funny because we're about to talk about population in about five minutes. Yeah, apparently the census records, the public doesn't have access to those for seventy two years after it's taken. I I guess, I guess some aspects of it, because it's I've definitely accessed census statistics that are a lot less than seventy two years old, right, I think you can access the numbers, but I think all of the information. Yeah, yeah, but the FBI routinely gets that information if they wanted. The Japanese Japanese Americans were identified using census statistics or sensus information during World War Two for the internment camp, right, Um, And uh, that that was I guess kind of against the grain. Maybe usually we don't usually do that, I understand. I think we do it done in Texas these days with UM Hispanics trying to make it across the border interesting. So writes violations all over the place, then, right, yes, but apparently it's having an effect on crime, Yeah, I guess so. UM supporters in England will say that more than twice as many crimes have been solved using the DNA samples in the year two thousand five as we're solved six years before that, and so you know, maybe it has an effect. It does. So they had the cameras over there too. Oh yeah, did you see those uh, those thugs and whales that got beat up? It was a cross stressing cage fighters. Yeah. Yeah, it's the best thing I've ever seen. Yeah, if you haven't seen, yeah, I guess typing, cross dressing, cage fighters, thugs, whales and it should bring up the video. These English thugs were just drunk and walking down the street, really just causing trouble and they were picking on this cross stresser and it turned out that it was a m M a cage fighter and the dude just kill them, wasted him. It was great. It's it's inspiring and I'll prevent the reader mail right now. Chuck meant Welsh and he knows it. So um, I guess everybody in the future look for a crime database that includes uh, psychological profile, uh hopefully your correct name or unless you're a criminal then not your real name, retinal scans, facial scans, medical history, pretty much anything. I got one more thing, okay, I saw. The United States has a project that was originally called Project Hostile Intent. They've since renamed it Future Attribute Screening Technologies, and it's one of these deals where they're gonna make it a mobile unit like a trailer truck that you walk through before you go into the football game and it reads your your pulse, your breathing rate, your your eye people dilation, and supposedly to predict if you're you know, like shifty or angry. Think about that. Um, yeah, I heard they're using uh we fit boards now to make people standard. They're talking about they were going to make people stand on because they think that. Um, terrorists are literally shiftier than other people, so like they would be shifting their weight more because they know something is about to go down. Um. Things like that don't take into account fear of flying. Well all, there's a lot of problems and stuff like that. Just what kind of mood urine that day if you and your wife just had a fight on the way to the airport, because Emily and I have a long standing tradition of fighting before any plane flight. Oh yeah, oh yeah, it's it's it's a good thing. Um. And then of course, once this is in place, one of the guys called what we would see a security theater, which is not being shifty or acting like you know, you're going to Hawaii on a vacation, so trying to trip up the machine. So look forward to that too. Yeah, the end, the end. So if you want to learn more about our colleague, Shanna Freeman's um predictions for future crime databases. You can probably get away with just typing in future crime in the certain far at how stuff works dot Com. Also try typing in Unicorn. See what comes up. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised. And Chuck I said, Uh, search bar right, which means it's time for listener mail. Josh, I'm gonna call this. Uh, I had no idea that we had a official listening club. That's what I'm gonna call it. This is on the blog, but I'm gonna read this, and this is kind of blew me away. The there are some U. S Americans living in South Korea, and they actually formed a little listening club and they get together and they listen to our show. And they said, during the assemblies, we listened to you to ponder various interesting topics and then discuss them further by offering our own thoughts and experiences, and complement our sessions with libations of the alcoholic variety. So they formed a drinking game to our show. Let me tell you what they drink too. And they're listening now, so we're going to really get them hammered at this point. Every time there's a new statistic quoted, which I believe we do on four out of five shows at least. And when we refer to our producer Jerry. Over here, there's Jerry. Hey, Jerry. So we've said Jerry like four times since probably about four shots. You said Jerry, I said Jerry. We refer to our producer Jerry when someone shares any of our first names. So if they're in the club and we say their first name, by happenstance, they drink And I know who wrote this was Richard, So we're gonna say Richard like four more times Richard, Yeah, and Jerry and uh, also, um, when chuckers, when you say chuckers, I don't know that I said that in this one, did I You could say now chuckers. And the final thing, Josh, they drink too. I think we're gonna like this is they're getting your back, dude. The whole I'm me thing that we've been hearing about for the past a hundred and sixty shows. Whenever you actually correct yourself now with the IMI is when they drink, so he writes and says, uh, they drink soju, by the way, which is a rice wine they say on Soju josh a say siped casually, the rice wine is not without its merits, but done our way. It all but guarantees a regrettable late night phone called to a coworker or former lover, fearful platitudes, mutual admiration, or some form of public nudity later in the evenings. So Josh, Sir, I beseech you stop hyper correcting. Let it fly pleadingly. Richard tired of being hungover in Korea, Richard, Richard, Well, thanks Richard for sending that in. Chuckers like Jerry liked it, Richard clearly liked Charle like it. And I and me and I'm sorry I shouldn't say that, I should correct myself. Well, if you want to send chuck in I and email, I'm sorry, chucking me an email or Chuckers chuckers an email and me uh, you can send that to stuff podcast at how stuff works dot com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, is that how stuff works dot com. Want more house stuff works, check out our blogs on the house stuff works dot com home page. M HM brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera it's ready. Are you

Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray. It's ready. Are you welcome to Stuff you should know from house Stuff Works dot Com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with me as always is Charles W. Bryant. Now you, Chuck, I'm here, Josh. Oh wait, this isn't the Halloween episode. No, No, that already, that already came out. That was good, though. I appreciate that. Yeah, that was really good. Well, truthfully, it's almost Halloween's I'm just in a spirit, are you? Yeah? In the spirit? Yes, dude, I have been punning lately left and right, and it's just it makes me sick. You have the stomach punkin though? Have you good one, Chuck? That reminds me that we've been We've been talking about this punk and chunking thing pretty hard. Let's do it again, Yeah time, let's we'll say it again. Okay, So the mothership of Discovery Channel has asked us to mention a show that's coming out a special, actually the pair of specials. It's coming out on Thanksgiving night, um on the Science Channel eight p m uh you got there's two shows, Like you said, the Road to punk and checking and punkin checking, punkin chunking itself and again that's that begins at eight p m. Eastern Time, because I believe it takes place in the Town in the East, which is appropriated no on Science Channel. Yeah, so Chuck, yes you want a podcast, Yeah, let's do it. Okay, So, Chuck, have you ever seen Minority Report? I have? Uh, sure, Steven Spielberg and the Yeah, yeah I knew. I knew Tom Cruise is in it. Didn't know Spielberg directed? Yeah, I thought it was okay, it kind of lost me in the third act, didn't, Yeah, big time. You know it's based on Philip K. Dick. Um, I think novel short story wasn't. Yeah, it was called the Minority Report. Oh yeah, that's Hollywood for you. They're always changing things. Yeah. But okay, so you you know, um that it's about a uh I guess, a crime section, anti crime section, law enforcement some people call it um that arrests people based on information given to them by this group of people who have precognition, and that would be the Office of pre Crime. Appropriately, the Cruise was a pre crime officer, right. Um, we have a real dearth of um people with genuine precognition. It's kind of tough to find three that you know, you can really reliably count on who can serve you images from their brain crimes that are about to happen. Yeah. They had a bad off in that movie too, they really did. They were Yeah, um we are. However, it seems like working on a database that will be able to predict crime and if so, humanity is screwed personal rights? Is that what you're getting in. Yeah, there's a lot of problems with this, but yeah, so there's a there's um, there's a database that there's several databases already um around right, there's all kinds of databases, sir. When I was a kid, um, uh, my dad took me to get my fingers printed, uh huh, just in case I was abducted. And I wouldn't talk to him on the way home. I was all, like, you redded me out, dad, just in case you got arrested. Your dad would just afford that, and so here you go, no no ready for him, you know, like it was put into this database. So yeah, ostensibly, so if I ever was kidnapped, and you know, was my brain was washed and I lost my identity. They'd be able to fingerprint me if I ever wandered up onto the to the street and they'd be like, oh, it's Josh Clark. The chances of that are slim to nune. The chances of meet committee a crime, We're talking like near percent. See. I was a kid during the Atlantic child murders, the famous murders Wayne Williams, remember that. So my mom was like, go, you know, go play by done of the Creek. Don't worry about fingerprinting. Yeah, go go get the mail down by the street, get the neighbor's mail, right, get all the name urs mail. Jeez, like you know where your children are? My mom never knew where I was. Yeah, well I survived. Well, yes, clearly you did. But so fingerprinting is just one database, right, Yeah, that's one. Uh, there's another one that's a little more advanced, a little more sophisticated. Um that is called the National Crime Information Center. Right. You ever watched the movie or the show the first forty eight? No, dude, it is good. Um. I sleep with a hammer next to my bed now because of that shows what's the concept there. Within the first two days is when all the evidence is like hot and yeah if they don't, if they don't close a homicide within the first forty eight hours, the chances of them ever closing it dropped dramatically. Yeah. So they sometimes they do, sometimes they don't. But it's a real life, um, real life uh show. Uh. And it follows like real life cops, like on the beat, like after a homicide, and like the stuff that people will do each other's just chilling. My favorite is this ball guy who works in Memphis. He's awesome Squidy It's not Squibby, Um, he's he would bust Squibby though I can tell you that. But um, they're this they they often access on the show, the National Crime Information Center. So it's got like all this information on people who are who have committed crimes. Um. But it's more than just their fingerprints. It could be like their street name that they're they're always using it to look up like somebody's street name. Um. It also has you know, people who are members or suspective members of like gangs organization. Yeah what else? You? Umi has this iPhone app that's disturbing. It's a locate a sex offender. Yeah, I've seen the website. They well they have an iPhone app for it now and like sure enough. There's a lot of sex offenders around our placed. And the weird thing is they aggregate like you'll you'll look at uh several of them and they'll all have the same address except like number six or number thirteen or whatever. So it's clearly an apartment building that's been designated like a sex offender can live here because it's not by a school or anything like that. Remember that article set recently about the they told the ones in Georgia to camp out that they quickly once it hit the news there or you can come back inside. Yeah, we'll find a place for you. Yeah. So okay, so we've got those two databases. There's another one and here's where we start to reach the crux of this podcast finally, after like seventy minutes, the one in England and here, Oh, well you're talking about the National DNA Database. Yeah. Yes, that started in uh England in and initially it was just people who had been uh convicted of crimes that they would get their DNA and keep that on file. Yeah, but that changed, didn't it. It did change, and I think two thousand three they expanded it UM to include anyone who's ever been arrested. So basically, if a cop goes I'm gonna take they can rescue and let you go on the spot. But if the cop can collect a sample right there, if he's got a mobile sample kit, they can take your blood even if you didn't do anything. Yeah, even if they're like, oh sorry, buddy, I had yeah exactly, and you can't say can I get that swab back? And they'll you know, they'll break your arms. And before two thousand six, I think they that that was still most people weren't getting arrested. But that year UM Britain expanded the the list of arrestable offenses, including wearing a seatbelt or more of the point, not wearing it. You're under arrest for wearing a seat bit into this speetree, right, so I mean that's uh yeah, and I imagine that's how they do it too, right as a swab. I don't know about the mobile kits. Probably I can imagine somebody going like, you're not breaking me yeah? So um but but yes, so now in England, if you jay walker, if you are not wearing a seatbelt, they can collect a sample of your DNA that they intend to keep on file indefinitely and four millions strong. Yeah, which makes it the second largest database in the world. DNA database in the world, second second to ours, I would imagine, of course. Uh. That was in two thousand seven, by the way, the four million entries UH that same year. In the US, we have a National DNA Index system in d I S that's maintained by the FBI. UH, and we had four point five million profiles that year. I looked and all I could find where estimates like FBI funding estimates. So these things are probably these numbers are probably high. But for two thousand nine, they estimated that this thing would have fourteen million samples. Now ours isn't just if you're arrested, right, isn't it if if you're a felon? Or does it state? That's how that's how it started out. Um. And then in two thousand and four, California, always on the leading edge of whatever is going on, they passed Prop. Sixty nine controversial it's to say the least. Yeah. Um. Basically, what it says is that law enforcement can take your DNA if you've been arrested for a felony. And some misdemeanors and it's just arrested. Yeah, and illegal immigrants, which they kind of just tossed in there. I'm sure, I'm sure. And let's see, how can we fairly target illegal immigrants? Oh yeah, we'll just take their DNA for no reason. Well there's kids in there too, Yeah, that's that's causing a huge stir is kids are being when they're arrested, they can have their DNA take. I'm sure. So you can imagine that just having your DNA taken, just having a swab stuck in your mouth by a police officer is enough to really raise the ire of some people. Yeah. Obviously a lot of human rights advocates have problems with this, which we'll get into in a second. Unless we're getting into that now. Uh, we can if you want. I mean, yeah, Well, the first thing that kind of got besides the implementation of the program in England, was last year in two thousand and eight, when it was revealed that half a million names in the database are just flat out wrong, and that was that caused a big stir Yeah, either just incorrect or misspelled, it might have been type of but some of them are just wrong. Yeah, that's clearly. I mean just having DNA samples of four and a half four million people in England and then saying oh, and by the way, half a million of them are are wrong. We don't know who's they are. We think they're yours, but they're not. That's a problem. But I mean, is there really a problem with just maintaining a database at d NA? What are they doing with it? Well, it depends because DNA it's not like a fingerprint. There's a lot of information contained in your DNA that's not just identified the person, right, your genetic code, your family history. There's a there's a program called d N a witness made by a company called DNA print Genomics UM, and it can locate ancestry markers and basically say, oh, you found some DNA, we can narrow it down to this person is probably being Hispanic. Well yeah, it's all to deal with racial racial breakdown, right, So I mean, there's racial profiling is about as hot button an issue as anything else, you know, because the problem is, as it stands now, racial profiling is based on past statistics. If you include DNA into the mix, does it become more finely honed or even more egregious, right or does it open itself up? Who knows. Here's the problem with DNA profiling, Chuck. We have not in this country or the UK, from what I can imagine, um, had any real discussion about doing it right we So we've never really come together and said, Okay, do we want a crime free society or as close to a crime free society as we can get. If so, then yes, everybody needs to turn in a DNA sample. If we all agreed that's what we want. If we decide that we would rather live with crime in combating crime under the techniques that we have now to maintain our privacy, then DNA sampling has to stop. DNA profiling has to stop. And the problem is we've never had that conversation either way, right, Well, the public certainly hasn't had so, but it's been continuing along. And then when you talk about the half a million names wrong, it's like, well, you're doing this without our consenter, even asking us, and you're not even doing it right right. The thing is, though they I don't even know, even if they hone this down, can you really prevent crime? I mean, even cops will tell you there's no such thing as preventing crime. Cops go after criminals after they've committed a crime. But unless it's just dumb luck, how many times has a cop come upon a crime before it happens and stopped it? Well that's there. There's there are two different um groups, one in the UK and one in America, which apparently are the two leading trees in DNA profiling for crime prevention. Um that are that that say no, we we do need to do that and we're trying to is that the homicide prevention unit in London think about the name of that homicide prevention unit and they're doing it by forecasting crime. Yeah, well, psychological profiling to which they've done for a while, and that's a little less hinky and invasive than obviously DNA profiling. Right, But what about when you combine the two. Why would you combine DNA with a psychological profile to catch the bad guys? I guess to an extent. But at the same time, what we're talking about is looking at DNA to find out if we can find a genetic defect in somebody that we suggest that maybe they have a short temper, or that they're sociopathic or whatever. If you combine that with a psychological profile. But where does that profile come from? Maybe records from mental health workers, or maybe your insurance records, or your doctor or dental records. I mean, and then doing that now, but who knows what could happen that. That's the point. If this database gets big enough, or I should say, if it gets accurate enough, then yeah, people will probably start getting leaned on to provide information to be contributed to this database for use by law enforce. Yeah. Once you have enough information and you are confident enough that you can prevent a crime, or if you can say this person is probably going to kill somebody, what do they do though? That's what I want to know. Did they just start It's obviously not gonna happen like Minority Report in that film and the story Tom Cruise knocks on your door and says you're under arrest for the future murder of your wife. They're clearly not talking about that. That's impossible in the stuff of science fiction. But what they just monitor someone or tail someone, so basically potentially dangerous people just be under surveillance at all times, I guess so. But what if you've never committed a crime in your entire life and don't intend to. But you've the cops breathing down your neck every night. Anywhere you go, there's a cop following you. You go on a date, there's a cop following you. You take your mother out for dinner, there's a cop following you. I mean, if you've never committed a crime in your life, how fair is that? Well? Right? And plus if someone's tailing you, and I don't know, I could I could see a scenario where some renegade cop um trumps up a traffic violation and pulls you over and shakes you down. And you know, it's not like police. I mean, trust me, I'm not dragging on the police, who do a great job. But there are cases where people are framed and weapons are planted. And if some guy they think is a really bad person waiting to happen, what's to stop a cop from trailing him and doing just that. So, not only that, but what happens if um, somebody gets access to this, if this information in the database is disseminated, and then you've got somebody who's like, well, you know what, I'm going to take it upon myself to rid society of these people. Who may commit a crime. You know, most I can't say most, but there's a lot serial killers out there who, once caught say that they were doing a service to society. Ever seen that. I haven't yet, but I am aware of same scenario. I love six ft under and he dies by the way. Um the the the killer John Wayne Gacy expected that he was going to get a rap on the knuckles because what he'd done is just rid society and some bad kids. That's what he said, Bernie gets I remember, and I guess was that the New York Yeah, he went Charlie Bronson on everyone, and he was the subway vigilantia. He definitely was. But he's a serial killer, is what he is. I thought he I thought he just killed some guys once. Did he kill more than one time? Yeah? I think so wow, I might be wrong. We'll hear from it. But um okay, so yes, there's a possibility of vigilantism. There's a possibility of police harassment. There's also another possibility called well self fulfilling prophecy. Um. Remember we talked about kids getting their DNA taken, Miners getting their DNA taken if they're ever arrested for anything UM. And there's also a push I guess to make to round this database out as much as possible for any kid who has a behavioral problem or maybe gets in trouble at school, for the school to provide information about that kid so that they can say, we're going to keep an eye on you for the rest of your life because you're starting to fit this profile with somebody who might kill somebody later, or maybe he just has a d D or maybe the teacher doesn't like him. Who knows. The problem is is if you know that if you're six and somebody's like, you might kill somebody someday, what is it like to grow up for the next thirty years or so thinking that people assume that you're gonna kill somebody one day? Well they tell you, though I I don't know, there's got to be something that it might not be that explicit. Both children parents are probably notified at the very least, right and if the parents say you're a bad kid, that's why they're watching you, well, why wouldn't the kid go be a bad kid? There's a lot of concern is here right in in the US UM we talked about the homicide prevention unit in the UK. By the way, the senior criminal psychologist Laura Richards has said that her vision is to know who the top one people most potentially violent people in London are at any given time. You know, Squibby's on that list. Sure, and you know when they keep like most wanted lists, gangs especially love getting at the top. And I should probably take the opportunity right here to save our lives. Uh, it's MS thirteen, I understand, not MS twelve. Right. Yeah, we've referred to a gang as MS twelve in the Witness Protection show and it is MS thirteen and we got that wrong. Agreed. Um. Over here in the U S there's a guy named Richard Burke who's the University of Pennsylvania sociologists and statistician. Yeah. I don't mind this one as much. No, it's much much more innocuous. Yeah, well, it's not an invasive because they're not actually taking your DNA or fingerprints. He uh was he a University of Pennsylvania. He's a cry I'm a criminology professor, and he has actually developed an algorithm using thirty different variables from you know, when a kid was young and as they grow up, if they have offenses or if they were abused, and he determines a lethality score, which I don't know, it's it's a little more I can I can accept this in a way I can't too. But at the same time, I was a little well, I'm still put off by the idea of forecasting crime and an effort to prevent it from ever happening. Um. But I did go on and check out some of this guy's stuff and he has another thing UM called crime regimes where he's taking into account see that that lethality score is all uh centered around the individual. And there's a movement of foot where sociology is making a huge move to take crime completely away from psychology. I talked to a sociologists who's like, psychology is completely failed at explaining serial murder. Sociology is time to explain it. Right. So this guy's taking into account like time of day, day of the weak area, UM, like like the location, uh is the drug trade there stable? If so, then there's probably gonna be less crime because there's not gonna be tur force things like that, UM. And even larger stuff needs to be taken into account to like the economic situation that always creates more crimes, but for a group or an area and not an individuals that what you mean. I imagine that this guy will probably eventually try to put both together. So if you've got a lethality score, guy with the lethality score, and he's living in a high risk area, then all of a sudden, the cops might want to go, we should really keep an eye on that guy, you know. So it makes it a little more honed. The problem is is this would probably be eventually compiled with the nd I S here in the States. Yeah, if it turned out to be a pretty good algorithm and it was pretty accurate, I'm sure the government would get their mits on it soon enough. So yeah, and it's not like, um, it's we were talking about health mental health workers being leaned on to to give up information, or doctors disclosing their met records. Insurance companies, UH and Census Information did not know this. I didn't either, which is funny because we're about to talk about population in about five minutes. Yeah, apparently the census records, the public doesn't have access to those for seventy two years after it's taken. I I guess, I guess some aspects of it, because it's I've definitely accessed census statistics that are a lot less than seventy two years old, right, I think you can access the numbers, but I think all of the information. Yeah, yeah, but the FBI routinely gets that information if they wanted. The Japanese Japanese Americans were identified using census statistics or sensus information during World War Two for the internment camp, right, Um, And uh, that that was I guess kind of against the grain. Maybe usually we don't usually do that, I understand. I think we do it done in Texas these days with UM Hispanics trying to make it across the border interesting. So writes violations all over the place, then, right, yes, but apparently it's having an effect on crime, Yeah, I guess so. UM supporters in England will say that more than twice as many crimes have been solved using the DNA samples in the year two thousand five as we're solved six years before that, and so you know, maybe it has an effect. It does. So they had the cameras over there too. Oh yeah, did you see those uh, those thugs and whales that got beat up? It was a cross stressing cage fighters. Yeah. Yeah, it's the best thing I've ever seen. Yeah, if you haven't seen, yeah, I guess typing, cross dressing, cage fighters, thugs, whales and it should bring up the video. These English thugs were just drunk and walking down the street, really just causing trouble and they were picking on this cross stresser and it turned out that it was a m M a cage fighter and the dude just kill them, wasted him. It was great. It's it's inspiring and I'll prevent the reader mail right now. Chuck meant Welsh and he knows it. So um, I guess everybody in the future look for a crime database that includes uh, psychological profile, uh hopefully your correct name or unless you're a criminal then not your real name, retinal scans, facial scans, medical history, pretty much anything. I got one more thing, okay, I saw. The United States has a project that was originally called Project Hostile Intent. They've since renamed it Future Attribute Screening Technologies, and it's one of these deals where they're gonna make it a mobile unit like a trailer truck that you walk through before you go into the football game and it reads your your pulse, your breathing rate, your your eye people dilation, and supposedly to predict if you're you know, like shifty or angry. Think about that. Um, yeah, I heard they're using uh we fit boards now to make people standard. They're talking about they were going to make people stand on because they think that. Um, terrorists are literally shiftier than other people, so like they would be shifting their weight more because they know something is about to go down. Um. Things like that don't take into account fear of flying. Well all, there's a lot of problems and stuff like that. Just what kind of mood urine that day if you and your wife just had a fight on the way to the airport, because Emily and I have a long standing tradition of fighting before any plane flight. Oh yeah, oh yeah, it's it's it's a good thing. Um. And then of course, once this is in place, one of the guys called what we would see a security theater, which is not being shifty or acting like you know, you're going to Hawaii on a vacation, so trying to trip up the machine. So look forward to that too. Yeah, the end, the end. So if you want to learn more about our colleague, Shanna Freeman's um predictions for future crime databases. You can probably get away with just typing in future crime in the certain far at how stuff works dot Com. Also try typing in Unicorn. See what comes up. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised. And Chuck I said, Uh, search bar right, which means it's time for listener mail. Josh, I'm gonna call this. Uh, I had no idea that we had a official listening club. That's what I'm gonna call it. This is on the blog, but I'm gonna read this, and this is kind of blew me away. The there are some U. S Americans living in South Korea, and they actually formed a little listening club and they get together and they listen to our show. And they said, during the assemblies, we listened to you to ponder various interesting topics and then discuss them further by offering our own thoughts and experiences, and complement our sessions with libations of the alcoholic variety. So they formed a drinking game to our show. Let me tell you what they drink too. And they're listening now, so we're going to really get them hammered at this point. Every time there's a new statistic quoted, which I believe we do on four out of five shows at least. And when we refer to our producer Jerry. Over here, there's Jerry. Hey, Jerry. So we've said Jerry like four times since probably about four shots. You said Jerry, I said Jerry. We refer to our producer Jerry when someone shares any of our first names. So if they're in the club and we say their first name, by happenstance, they drink And I know who wrote this was Richard, So we're gonna say Richard like four more times Richard, Yeah, and Jerry and uh, also, um, when chuckers, when you say chuckers, I don't know that I said that in this one, did I You could say now chuckers. And the final thing, Josh, they drink too. I think we're gonna like this is they're getting your back, dude. The whole I'm me thing that we've been hearing about for the past a hundred and sixty shows. Whenever you actually correct yourself now with the IMI is when they drink, so he writes and says, uh, they drink soju, by the way, which is a rice wine they say on Soju josh a say siped casually, the rice wine is not without its merits, but done our way. It all but guarantees a regrettable late night phone called to a coworker or former lover, fearful platitudes, mutual admiration, or some form of public nudity later in the evenings. So Josh, Sir, I beseech you stop hyper correcting. Let it fly pleadingly. Richard tired of being hungover in Korea, Richard, Richard, Well, thanks Richard for sending that in. Chuckers like Jerry liked it, Richard clearly liked Charle like it. And I and me and I'm sorry I shouldn't say that, I should correct myself. Well, if you want to send chuck in I and email, I'm sorry, chucking me an email or Chuckers chuckers an email and me uh, you can send that to stuff podcast at how stuff works dot com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, is that how stuff works dot com. Want more house stuff works, check out our blogs on the house stuff works dot com home page. M HM brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera it's ready. Are you