But the official explanation of speed cameras (or safety cameras as they tried to rename them) was not actually to catch people speeding but to deter them from speeding at accident blackspots. In that sense, apps that let people know well in advance where there are cameras are a good thing. And apps that route them away from accident blackspots are just as good.
From my wee bits of research with naughty drivers, what the requirement to over-read does is contribute to the notion that there is a game being played between drivers and enforcement. The game involves a speed zone around a notional 'limit' within which speeds are more or less compliant. The zone starts at that shade under the limit where the speedometer points at a number but where real speed is a little less. The zone ends at the point above the limit at which some enforcement mechanism might take effect - where a camera might flash or a police officer in a car might bat an eyelid. That there is a margin above the 'limit' that attracts no attention means that the limit doesn't function to demarcate 'safe' and 'unsafe'.
For instance most people know that a camera won't flash until you're well over 30mph (it used to be 42mph but I think it was progressively brought closer to 35mph - the famous 10% + 2mph). On a motorway, you can pass a police car at up to 80mph and there's little chance of them doing anything.
What all this does is create a perception that 30mph or 50mph or 70mph is a sort of advisory average that you should be somewhere around.
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