Automatic License Plate Readers (ALPRs), also known as Car Plate Scanners, have become increasingly prevalent in law enforcement and surveillance. These sophisticated devices, initially developed to streamline toll collection and parking enforcement, now play a significant role in tracking vehicle movements and raising critical privacy concerns. This article delves into the workings of car plate scanners, explores the issues surrounding their use, and examines the implications for civil liberties.
Understanding Car Plate Scanners: How They Work
Car plate scanners are advanced surveillance tools that automatically capture and record license plate information. These systems utilize high-speed cameras and optical character recognition (OCR) software to convert images of license plates into alphanumeric data. Typically mounted on police vehicles, traffic poles, or roadside infrastructure, car plate scanners operate by capturing images of every passing vehicle’s license plate.
The process involves:
- Image Capture: Specialized digital cameras continuously capture images of license plates within their field of view.
- Optical Character Recognition (OCR): Sophisticated software analyzes these images, identifies the license plate characters, and converts them into digital text.
- Data Recording: Along with the license plate number, car plate scanners record the date, time, and geographic location of each scan. This data is then stored in a database.
- “Hot List” Comparison: The system cross-references captured license plate numbers against a “hot list.” This list contains license plates associated with vehicles of interest, such as stolen cars, wanted individuals, or those linked to outstanding warrants.
- Alert System: If a scanned license plate matches an entry on the “hot list,” the system immediately alerts law enforcement personnel.
Modern car plate scanners boast remarkable efficiency, capable of scanning thousands of license plates per hour, processing a vast amount of data with minimal human intervention.
The Privacy Dilemma: Why Car Plate Scanners Raise Concerns
The fundamental issue with car plate scanners is their indiscriminate data collection. These devices record every license plate they scan, regardless of whether the vehicle is suspected of any wrongdoing. The sheer volume of data collected on ordinary citizens, the vast majority of whom are not under suspicion, presents significant privacy challenges.
Consider the example of the Rhinebeck Police Department, which scanned 164,043 license plates in just three months, with only eight plates matching a “hot list” – a staggering 99.99% “failure rate” in terms of identifying vehicles of interest. This illustrates that car plate scanners primarily collect data on law-abiding individuals.
The implications of this mass data collection are profound:
- Detailed Movement Tracking: Car plate scanners create a comprehensive record of an individual’s travels, revealing patterns of life, daily routines, and frequented locations.
- Potential for Misuse: The data can be used to infer sensitive information about individuals, such as visits to medical clinics, political gatherings, religious institutions, or addiction support groups. This raises concerns about potential chilling effects on freedom of association and expression.
- Database Accumulation: Law enforcement agencies can amass extensive databases of location data, potentially storing years’ worth of information on innocent individuals. This data can be shared with other agencies and even private entities, expanding the scope of surveillance.
- Lack of Regulation: In many jurisdictions, clear policies and regulations governing the use, storage, and sharing of car plate scanner data are lacking. This absence of oversight increases the risk of misuse and privacy violations.
The example of the Beacon Police Department’s records highlights the intrusiveness of this technology. Analyzing just one week of data for a single vehicle revealed 24 location points, painting a detailed picture of the driver’s movements, including overnight parking locations. Extrapolate this to a larger scale – continuous tracking of millions of vehicles over extended periods – and the potential for comprehensive surveillance becomes apparent.
Proliferation of Car Plate Scanners: Ownership and Reach
Car plate scanners are not limited to major metropolitan areas. They are deployed across a wide spectrum of municipalities, from large cities to small towns. Funding from sources like the Division of Criminal Justice Services has facilitated the widespread adoption of this technology.
In New York State alone, as of 2013, at least 422 car plate scanner systems were funded by the Division of Criminal Justice Services, ensuring that every county in the state possessed at least one system. This figure excludes systems owned by the New York State Police, the Department of Motor Vehicles, and the New York Police Department (NYPD), indicating an even greater prevalence.
Even small communities, such as Oxford Village, Rhinebeck Village, and Gowanda Village in New York, utilize car plate scanners, demonstrating the technology’s accessibility and broad adoption. The NYPD, as of 2014, operated nearly 500 car plate scanners within its Domain Awareness System, a centralized surveillance network.
Density of Automatic License Plate Readers per 100,000 Residents in New York State
Darker areas on the map indicate a higher concentration of car plate scanners per resident.
Data Access and Sharing: Expanding the Surveillance Network
The reach of car plate scanner data extends beyond individual jurisdictions. Data sharing agreements and collaborations between law enforcement agencies create interconnected surveillance networks. For example, the Westchester Intelligence Center facilitates data sharing among various federal, state, and local agencies operating in Westchester County. Similarly, the Albany Crime Analysis Center serves as a regional data-sharing hub.
Furthermore, partnerships with private companies like Vigilant Solutions amplify the scope of data collection. Vigilant Solutions maintains a massive nationwide database of license plate data, compiled from both private and law enforcement car plate scanners. This database, containing billions of records and growing by millions more each month, is accessible to law enforcement agencies through subscription services.
The NYPD’s contract with Vigilant Solutions exemplifies this trend, granting the department access to a vast repository of location data spanning apartment complexes, retail areas, and business districts – locations potentially beyond the reach of NYPD-owned scanners. This access enables historical and real-time tracking, virtual stakeouts, and the identification of vehicles frequently seen together, significantly enhancing surveillance capabilities.
Policy Gaps and the Need for Safeguards
The absence of uniform statewide or national regulations governing car plate scanner usage results in a patchwork of inconsistent policies across different localities. Many jurisdictions lack adequate safeguards to protect privacy and prevent misuse of collected data.
Westchester County, despite having a high concentration of car plate scanners, lacked a written policy regarding their use, data storage, access, or sharing as of 2012. The county planned to retain location data for a year, even though the vast majority of scans yielded no actionable intelligence. Yonkers, another municipality within Westchester County, similarly lacked a written policy and admitted to indefinitely storing all collected data.
The lack of robust privacy protections raises serious concerns. To mitigate the chilling effects of car plate scanner technology and foster public trust, local governments must prioritize the adoption of comprehensive policies that address:
- Data Retention Limits: Establishing clear time limits for data storage to minimize the accumulation of long-term records on innocent individuals.
- Access Controls: Implementing strict protocols governing who can access car plate scanner data and for what purposes.
- Data Sharing Restrictions: Limiting data sharing with external agencies and private entities, ensuring data remains within appropriate jurisdictional boundaries and oversight.
- Transparency and Accountability: Publicly disclosing policies and practices related to car plate scanner usage and establishing mechanisms for accountability and oversight.
- Purpose Limitation: Clearly defining and limiting the permissible uses of car plate scanner data to legitimate law enforcement purposes, preventing mission creep and misuse for unrelated objectives.
For a comprehensive overview of car plate scanner usage nationwide, refer to the ACLU report, “You Are Being Tracked: How License Plate Readers Are Being Used to Record Americans’ Movements.”
DOCUMENTS
New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services
2012-07-30 FOIL Request
2013-08-27 FOIL Response
New York City Police Department
2014-01-07 FOIL Request
FOIL Response
New York City Comptroller
2015-04-09 Vigilant Solutions Contract
Localities Outside of New York City
FOIL Request to Non-New York City Localities, including:
- Albany County Sheriff’s Department (Parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8)
- Ardsley Village
- Beacon City
- Bedford Town
- Blooming Grove
- Bronxville
- Chatham Village
- Chestertown
- Colonie Police Department (Parts 1, 2, 3, 4)
- Columbia County Sheriff
- Croton-on-Hudson Village
- Deerpark Town
- Dutchess County Office of Probation and Community Corrections
- Dutchess County Sheriff’s Office
- Fishkill Town
- Greenburgh Town
- Hudson (Parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5)
- Irvington Village
- Mamaroneck Town
- Mamaroneck Village
- Middletown City
- Monroe
- Mount Hope Town
- Mount Pleasant Town
- New Castle Town
- New Paltz Town
- New Rochelle City
- New Windsor Town
- Newburgh City
- Newburgh Town
- Orange County Probation Department
- Orangetown
- Ossining Village
- Peekskill City
- Pelham Village
- Port Jervis City
- Poughkeepsie City
- Poughkeepsie Town
- Rensselaer County Sheriff (Parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7)
- Rhinebeck Village
- Rockland County Sheriff
- Saratoga County Sheriff
- Saratoga Springs (Parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7)
- Saugerties
- Scarsdale Village
- Schenectady Police Department (Parts 1, 2)
- Shawangunk Town
- Sleepy Hollow
- Spring Valley Village
- Stony Point Town
- Sullivan County
- Ulster Town
- Warren County
- Warwick Town
- Washington County Sheriff (Parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9)
- Westchester County Department of Public Safety
- Yonkers City
- Yorktown Town
Footnotes
1 New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services, License Plate Reader Suggested Guidelines, Jan. 2011 at p. 6, available at http://www.criminaljustice.ny.gov/ofpa/pdfdocs/finallprguidelines01272011a.pdf.
2 Id.
3 Id.
4 Id. at p.7.
5 Id. at p.6.
6 Rhinebeck Police Department FOIL Response: Quarterly License Plate Reader Progress Report Apr.-Jun 2011.
7 International Association of Chiefs of Police, Privacy Impact Assessment Report for Utilization of License Plate Readers (Sept. 2009) at p. 2, available at http://www.theiacp.org/Portals/0/pdfs/LPR_Privacy_Impact_Assessment.pdf.
8 Id. at p.13.
9 New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services (DCJS) FOIL Response (Aug. 27, 2013).
10 Population numbers and area are from the 2010 Census of Population and Housing, available at http://www.census.gov/prod/cen2010/cph-2-34.pdf
11 Testimony of Deputy Commissioner of Intelligence and Counterterrorism John J. Miller, NYPD, Nov. 12, 2014.
12 See, e.g., Ardsley Village FOIL Response; Bedford Town FOIL Response;
13 See, e.g., Colonie PD FOIL Response.
14 Vigilant Solutions Scope of Work.
15 DCJS FOIL Response.
16 Westchester County Department of Public Safety FOIL Response.
17 Id..
18 City of Yonkers FOIL Response.
19 Id.
