How Automatic License Plate Recognition (ALPR) Technology Works

I don't deny this is effective at catching criminals, but how is it not an invasion of privacy? I realize it is a privilege to drive on American roads but if this system tracks every time I drive in or out of a city from it's fixed cameras how could it not be an invasion of privacy to track my movements?

Drew K

Sometimes is best to take the roads less traveled.

An invasion of privacy requires an expectation of privacy. On that account I applaud you for yours.

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In this era of millions acting as unwitting spies by putting anything and everything on social networks, the line where a reasonable expectation of privacy begins has receded severely from former positions.

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To be fair, having a cop run your license plate, or even follow you on the road for no particular legal reason, has been accepted as fair game for a long time. Basically if anyone might see you do whatever you are doing in public, it isn't protected under a right to privacy.

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To be useful, your expectation of privacy will probably need to retrench a bit further back to a position that still has a chance to make a difference. Perhaps protesting warrantless wiretaps or requirements to show papers at random checkpoints would be a good place to focus.

True, but I don't recall signing away my right to travel to and from a city without my movements being recorded.

When I make a social media account (if I give them my right name) I have to click on their terms of service that effectively signs away my rights to any data I choose to provide them with. I get that comprimise of my privacy.

What I don't get is how they can track and record my travels. I know this type of thing has been going on for years and not just in the U.S., the U.K. has cameras that record your plate number and report if you travel the distance between cameras faster than the speed limit.

Our basic right to privacy has been eroded worldwide with the greed for money driving a demand for our shopping habits and travel locations. I have no doubt that all those free maps provided by google on your smart phone also track your movements and which stores you visit if you leave your GPS on. Or even if you don't leave it on, they will use wifi points you access or any other digital trickery to follow you.

The police are publicly tracking your movements, but who are they sharing that data with?

A hundred years ago we needed unions to protect us from big businesses that would enslave their workers with minimal pay and exhorberant charges for housing or company store purchases. Now we need Information Unions to protect us from malicious data mining and target advertising that is designed by psychologists to get us to give more and more of our money to our new slave masters, the all mighty corporate entities that are pushed and motivated by the greed of their investors.

Drew K

I am sympathetic to your concerns and I urge you to consider focusing your energy on areas over which there is still some debate.

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Protesting against efforts to record the movement on public roadways of a privately owned vehicle have near negligible chance at succeeding and possibly can result in turning off more moderate fence sitters on similar subjects.

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Here is the problem. If your neighbor tells you that his daughter says she saw you in the Burger King drive through with your Aunt Betty; if you are a reasonable person you are not going to be outraged or feel your privacy has been violated. Since you were in public and made no effort to conceal your movements or identity, you reasonably had no expectation of privacy.

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This naturally extends not just to your neighbors but to everyone since the necessary expectation is not theirs but yours.

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So when the cops note that they saw your car in the Burger King drive through, it is not a violation of privacy, because you had no expectation thereof.

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If you want your travel to be private, you need to take steps so that you can expect privacy, such as:

Conceal your identity when in open places, i.e. obscure your eyes cheekbones, nose, and jaw line as much as possible;

To conceal your identity you must not travel in a vehicle that can be used to identify you (your car, a friend's car, or a car they'll soon figure out you stole). Viable options include using a cab (but don't call them to your house or using your phone and pay only with cash) or (with similar precautions) public transport.

Additionally if you desire to have private travels, avoid personally identifying transactions during your travels....no trips to the bank, consulate, IRS, etc.

Without these these or similar steps, you can't expect your travels to be private, so there isn't really any violation....

It is not so much my privacy or my actions, or anyone's activities I am concerned about. It is not that anybody can see me going anywhere. It is just that when it comes to the level of your movements being captured and recorded by fixed cameras mounted around the city I start becoming concerned about a police state.

I served in my countries military to protect it's citizens right to free speech, beliefs and unrestricted (unmonitored) travel. Even if I don't agree with some of the things protested and would protest against them, I served for their right to protest.

There has to be a line drawn that we don't cross to respect innocent citizens privacy. I know this system is effective at catching guilty citizens who deal with stolen vehicles but it also records and tracks the innocent. The next step which is already opened is recording of all communication possible of being recorded.

Would it be ok for the police to set up sensitive microphones and computer systems that recorded everything said within range? If I go to a park or the forest or my front yard and talk to my neighbor or friend is it ok to record it just because I am not secure in my own house with soundproofed walls?

With your argument, I might get spotted cheating on my diet with fast food if I happen to be spotted by a nosy neighbor (or relative). But it IS different when that person (police) record every time I pass a traffic camera.

Drew K

Please understand, I am not arguing in support of the increased levels of surveillance of the citizenry. I find the never-tiring conversion of efforts from watching out for the people, to watching the people, highly disturbing.

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My comments are merely suggestions of a pragmatic nature, not philosophical.

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A few comments on what you previously wrote:

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I am unaware of any right to unmonitored travel.

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Audible conversations as well as visible actions in public (in a park, your front yard, on a street, etc) can reasonably be expected to have a non-negligible chance of being seen or heard by others. This precludes an expectation of privacy. Public is the antithesis of private in this and many other respects.

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Electronic one to one communications(phone calls, emails, texts, etc), IMHO, SHOULD be private, requiring a legal wiretap for anyone else to be privy to the conversation. reports of warrantless use of things like NarusInsight, Room 614A, DCS3000, DCS5000, and DCS6000, suggest that electronic one to one communications are not necessarily one to one.

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It isn't that I'm not bothered by the prospect of 100% video surveillance of all public spaces, I'm just not sure of what legal grounds this can be prohibited. I am pretty certain it isn't privacy.

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I saw another disturbing bit of technology the other day. It uses polarized light and three commonly available CMOS chips, allowing it to take identifiable pictures of the fingerprints of a person walking by 30 feet away...... This to me, does seem like an invasion of privacy as it is not information available to the unaided person on the street.... much like a camera pointed up a woman's skirt on a public street would still be an invasion of privacy.

I don't suspect you enjoy the prospect of having all of one's activities recorded either (but I am enjoying your counter point).

When I was young, I read many science fiction books, Heinlein, Norton and the like. Some of the potential futures they wrote of terrify me today as I see Government and Businesses gathering more and more information about people. The information itself is not the problem, it is how it is used. I fear that too much of this information is being used by wealthy elitists in business and government to acquire more wealth. The acquisition of wealth is not bad in itself either; but acquisition at the expense of the people who actually do the work is a problem.

Just like a monarchy is not a bad thing if the monarch is one who protects the people and promotes a fair distribution of wealth. I know that phrase "distribution of wealth" leaves a foul taste, but taken at its benevolent meaning it is not bad. What I mean is you pay a worker what they are worth for the job they do. Earnings should reflect work done, allowing for profits of the worker and business.

A bad example of profit distribution is the Air Line (some years ago) in America that folded because the union refused to stop a strike. The union thought they could break the back of the business and increase earnings for the workers, instead the company folded (i wish I could remember the name).

A worse example is a company like Wal-Mart who exports the profits from a local area and sends it to already wealthy investors who did none of the work. I know the investors put the money up front for the store to be built there and to run the business, but don't they realize that if they paid their employees more those people would in turn spend more at their store, and other local businesses...whose employees would in also spend more money in Wal-Mart? The investors would make their money by the economic stimulus the increased wages provide.

To tie this back to the police surveillance, if Wal-Mart were to record conversations in their store and have it analyzed by some (not so futuristic) computer would it be an invasion of privacy? I think so, just as a conversation between me and my buddy in my driveway should be considered restricted to only those within reasonable human earshot. Just as recording my registration plate with a computerized camera which records every vehicle is different than being spotted by a random busybody or aunt.

Just because we have given up or rights to "expected" privacy inch by inch doesn't mean it is right or ok. Like they say ' the path to hell is paved with good intentions' so has been the erosion of our expected privacy...and many other rights. The American founding fathers couldn't have expected the technology today that invades privacy every day...otherwise they would have written them in too.

Drew K.

'....The American founding fathers couldn't have expected the technology today that invades privacy every day....'

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While they almost certainly didn't imagine in detail the extent of today's technology, they were very aware of corrupting influence of power....however that power was brought about. They realized the futility of attempting to outlaw every possible thing that might encroach upon rights and instead define the rights and limit the powers of government.

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I don't know if they were alive today if they could suggest any legislation to remedy the problem. We can't bad record keeping....no one would remember it wasn't allowed.

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It is also possible that they realized this type of think can't be legislated against, but none the less detailed an effective remedy....

...a remedy the populace is far to fat, complacent and sleepy to take seriously....

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''The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants'' -Thomas Jefferson.

By the way I am also enjoying our discourse.

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This is something I think you might appreciate... and an alternative to Jefferson's suggestion.

I think one good solution would be to have a separation of Church, State and Business. There should also be limits on political advertisements. A political science instructor friend of mine told me there are some countries where the Govt is the only source of political campaign funds; if you qualify for election you are awarded the same funds as everyone else qualified.

I am also for term limits for every office, I feel it is professional politicians that allow the erosion of the citizens rights. The longer they are in office the more favors they owe.

Drew K