Posted on 07/17/2013 7:39:27 AM PDT by don-o
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Chances are, your local or state police departments have photographs of your car in their files, noting where you were driving on a particular day, even if you never did anything wrong.
Using automated scanners, law enforcement agencies across the country have amassed millions of digital records on the location and movement of every vehicle with a license plate, according to a study published Wednesday by the American Civil Liberties Union. Affixed to police cars, bridges or buildings, the scanners capture images of passing or parked vehicles and note their location, uploading that information into police databases. Departments keep the records for weeks or years, sometimes indefinitely.
(Excerpt) Read more at hosted.ap.org ...
RIP Liberty.
I like NM because we don’t have front plates and can put a camera cover (to prevent photos) on our rear.
This stuff is just creepy.
This is why I gave up and got an EZ-Pass tollway transponder. I’m being tracked anyway and may as well get the convenience benefits.
I was wondering if one could fool these things by placing lots of other random numbers and letters in the area surrounding one’s license plate... some stick-on vinyl letters made in the license plate font.
Electric Eye - Judas Priest
Up here in space
Im looking down on you
My lasers trace
Everything you do
You think youve private lives
Think nothing of the kind
There is no true escape
Im watching all the time
Im made of metal
My circuits gleam
I am perpetual
I keep the country clean
Im elected electric spy
Im protected electric eye
Always in focus
You cant feel my stare
I zoom into you
You dont know Im there
I take a pride in probing all your secret moves
My tearless retina takes pictures that can prove
Im made of metal
My circuits gleam
I am perpetual
I keep the country clean
Im elected electric spy
Im protected electric eye
Electric eye, in the sky
Feel my stare, always there
Theres nothing you can do about it
Develop and expose
I feed upon your every thought
And so my power grows
Im made of metal
My circuits gleam
I am perpetual
I keep the country clean
Im elected electric spy
Im protected electric eye
Yet we still are not allowed to even ask about Ubama’s birth certificate.
When government grows, liberty contracts.
Your car itself contains a black box that records ever more and more data. Your cell phone number can be followed from tower to tower. Soon your car will upload the GPS path directly to the NSA I figure.
A year or so back I got a notice from my electric company warning that we may have power outages. They said that they were testing communication between electric cars and the smart grid.
They said it was for future billing and load estimation purposes but if they can collect that info, they can and will collect a lot more.
I work from home.
Rarely drive anywhere.
NSA be bored with me.
I also have a ‘77 sedan. Not much in that car reporting back to DC :)
Do us a favor and post a link for buying the camera cover for the rear plate.
Where can I get an “obscene hand gesture” hood ornament?
Here’s a way to dodge the cameras:
http://shopping.photomaskcover.com/products/license-plate-blocker
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=doiu_os1M98
That's likely to get you arrested, as the cameras take an actual photo.
Some Maryland teenagers were pranking adults they did not like by generating fake copies of their license plates using a computer, putting them on cars and then driving through red light cameras.
The authorities were freaking out as it was drawing so much attention to the unreliability of the system.
How can that work? I've seen covers that have a retroreflective coating so if there is a flash camera the flash will be reflected directly back at the camera to overload it, but I don't know how a camera using ambient light can be blocked if a normal person can see it.
Maybe you could have the cover etched so that it is easy to see from ground level but blocked from a higher angle which cameras would have. Or maybe you could put an LCD film in the cover which blocks one side of the plate half the time and the other side the rest of the time, so in any individual frame only half the number can be seen. Run that fast enough so visually it just looks like a gray cover.
I’ll save them the trouble. First stop is the gun store then McDonalds, the whorehouse, the golf course, and the local bar. They’re probably already there.
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