The License Plate Privacy Act
End dragnet license plate tracking in Massachusetts!
S.1648 (Creem) || H.3068 (Hecht)
Collecting location information about every driver goes too far.
Stop the bulk gathering of detailed data
showing where innocent drivers go, day and night.
The License Plate Privacy Act will ensure that license plate scanners are used to ID cars
associated with AMBER Alerts, warrants, or registration problems, not to track innocent
motorists. Keeping detailed information about the movements of people who are not
suspected of any wrongdoing goes too far. Police should check the data, then chuck it.
Billions and billions scanned
A single license plate scanner on a police cruiser can capture thousands of plates per
minute. It stores information in a database – including the plate number, the date and time,
and the car’s GPS location. This database becomes a trove of personal data showing where
people go, and when. Without limits, license plate tracking can be used to monitor people’s
location information for inappropriate reasons, from personal to political surveillance.
Risky business
In addition to local and state police, the private companies that sell the scanners build
enormous databases. One such company already has 1.5 billion scans in its database, and
adds 70 million more every month. Moreover, they already sell scanning equipment to
insurance companies, and it’s not hard to imagine them selling drivers’ data as well.
The trouble in Boston
The Boston Police Department recently suspended its license plate tracking program
because of privacy concerns, after accidentally releasing the plate numbers and location of
more than 68,000 scanned vehicles. They also failed to enforce violations that were
identified dozens of times, raising serious questions about the program’s purpose.
In your community
More than 60 Massachusetts municipalities―in which a majority of state residents live and
work―use license plate scanners. Yet most municipalities have no policies about how they
are used, or rules limiting long-term tracking of drivers.
Check it, then chuck it.
Law enforcement should not collect and keep information about where law abiding people
go. After scans are used to identify violations, “non-hit” data should be deleted unless law
enforcement has good reason to believe it shows evidence of a crime.
It’s time for Massachusetts to join our neighbors in Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont
by setting rules for license plate tracking and protecting residents’ privacy today.
ACLUM.org/donttrackme