License Plate Readers in a Post-Roe America

Without delving into the politics of Roe v. Wade, the decision and the laws that are happening as a result of the recent Supreme Court decision, bring up some very challenging privacy issues.

Automated license plate readers can be found in many places. There is an entire network of tow truck owners that collect license plate information and load it into a central database used for repossessions, among other things. Many police cars have license plate readers. There are license plate readers telephone poles.

One private company, Flock Safety, says that they are collecting data in 1,500 cities in 42 states. They can capture data from over a billion license plates a month.

Since the license plate information plus location are being captured on public roadways, there is no right of privacy. The companies and agencies that collect this data are not restricted from selling it. To anyone. Flock claims that they don’t sell their data to third parties, including anti-abortion groups, but they don’t know about other companies.

BUT, a third party can become a first party for the cost of a camera. Mitch’s Home Owner’s Association could buy one of Flock’s cameras, at which point they are a first party.

A March 2021 Vice investigation said that anyone who administers a Flock camera can make the data Flock captures available to, say, the police, home owner association’s board or the individual members of an entire neighborhood.

Unlike the police obtaining location data from a cell phone carrier, police don’t need a warrant to obtain license plate data.

If the person leaves the state, someone could obtain location data from private databases. Police departments around the country regularly share license plate data and since it is not considered private, there is little oversight.

With laws like Texas Senate Bill 8 which allows a private citizen to sue anyone involved in the abortion process – even someone giving an abortion seeker a ride and get money as a result of that lawsuit, these databases have become very valuable.

Every state has different rules for collecting license plate data and by whom. They also have different rules for how long the government or a citizen can store that data.

While right now some people’s concern is related to abortions, the cat is out of the bag. The data could be used for any number of other purposes that potentially invade people’s privacy. Once people understand how to get this data, they will get creative in terms of how it is used and for what. If the cost to get the data is the cost to buy a single Flock camera, that is a pretty low bar. Other data sources may cost even less.

One of the challenges of tech is that once we create it, it is impossible to restrict how it is used. You may remember the quote attributed to World War II German rocket scientist Wernher Von Braun who said “Once the rockets go up, who cares where they come down”. This is kind of like that.

I do not believe there is any way to put the genie back in the bottle.

Credit: Wired

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