Posted on 10/25/2020 3:22:22 AM PDT by ptsal
The Rutherford Institute is calling a decision by the Virginia Supreme Court to give police departments unrestricted use of Automated License Plate Readers to gather data statewide about residents a "blow to privacy."
The legal team had asked the court to decide in its Fairfax County Police Department v. Neal case that the use of the computerized spy programs violated a state law restricting government collection of personal information.
(Excerpt) Read more at wnd.com ...
"Mounted next to traffic lights or on police cars, ALPRs photograph over 1,800 license tag numbers per minute, take a picture of every passing license tag number and store the tag number and the date, time, and location of the picture in a searchable database," the organization reported. "The data is then shared with law enforcement, fusion centers and private companies and used to track the movements of persons in their cars. There are reportedly tens of thousands of these license plate readers now in operation throughout the country. It is estimated that over 99% of the people being unnecessarily surveiled are entirely innocent."
Virginia Gulag
4th Amendment issue?
Ridiculous. There is no expectation of privacy for a license plate. It’s there, publicly visible, to be viewed by accident victims and the police. Nothing private about it. Same thing with hair, faces, clothes and posture. Someone’s trying to rewrite the definition of “privacy” to mean something excessively restrictive, so that lawlessness and mayhem can reign free.
Well now, my face, my hair belong to me. If you want to put me in your data base ok, fork over 10 million dollars, i am a capitalist.
When knocking over a liquor store, don’t forget to wear a ski mask, if you treasure your privacy, and gloves to protect your finger prints from detection.
The Communist Chinese have full coverage of the nation using facial recognition feeding a massive database that tracks citizen and non-citizen movements.
Zero privacy and total state control.
Of course, this cannot be misused by totalitarian governments......
I do not “knock over” stores. Wouldn’t mind popping a few blm types though.
That’s a good point. Once you accept that licensing drivers and registering vehicles is OK — even necessary — then it’s hard to expect any kind of privacy when it comes to information that is visible in public.
“There is no expectation of privacy for a license plate. It’s there, publicly visible, to be viewed by accident victims and the police. Nothing private about it. Same thing with hair, faces, clothes and posture.”
That certainly is the arguing position of people who want to be able to ‘pull up’ a complete history of anyone’s movements over time (maybe criminals, but maybe ex lovers, stalkee’s, employees, contractors working for cash, political opponents, and God knows who else).
In the past they’d have to hire Private Investigators to get that information, so it was very expensive and rarely done. Now government can simply run cameras and use other electronic means and automatically have their history. Excellent for IRS, also works great in China, where one is lucky to be able to leave their apartment building to buy a loaf of bread a few doors over without it recorded.
Maybe it is need here, since we do have a lot of crime, but do we really want to hand government those tools - particularly after what the FBI has now been shown to be doing with far less capabilities?
I’m a little torn on this issue. If you’re out in public, in plain sight, your expectations of privacy are kind of null and void. Police officers can visually observe your license plate and act on those observations, so why would a computer operation be much different?
But active tracking is another issue.
On the same note, most people haven't a clue how their cellphone tracks and reports on them 24/7. They are far more intrusive on a person's privacy than anything else.
It’s the ARCHIVING of the data that’s the problem. When your plate is read and the time and location is archived, soon there will be a data base that has a history of your daily movements. From that, your future movements can be predicted.
Not a whole lot different than having a Bill Gates chip implanted in your skull.
Agreed. They use this for alerting them to stolen vehicles, fugitive identification, and amber alert/be on the lookout situations. I consider this is non-issue. It is no more of a violation of your rights than a situation when there is not an expectation to privacy covering a public conversation.
So it’s on to the Federal courts.
The local police are now being used to do this. Looting rioting burning raping murdering no. What do we call this?
You also need to prove damages. You would have to prove:
1) Your face is a known brand which produces revenue for you
2) The publication of your image made $ specifically from using your face (vs. a generic)
3) Your brand was weakened from that use
4) Amount of $ the use weakened your brand (via forensic accounting analysis)
Good luck surmounting ANY of these hurdles, even if you got past the expectation of privacy.
If Tom Cruise were to go to Trader Joe's and I caught a pic of him and sold it for $20,000 he would have no basis for a suit.
Thus, papparazzi.
A person who knows where you live could park on the street outside your house, follow you wherever you go, and record every place you go — and it’s all perfectly legal.
It’s interesting to note that Justice Clarence Thomas of all people made a key point in a landmark case involving cell phone records — when he pointed out that the cell phone tracking data collected by your phone carrier is NOT protected under the Fourth Amendment.
I realize the herd is out of the gate already but...
I doubt the founding fathers would have put up the requirement of having to have a license plate for their wagons or carriages. Or required to have a drivers license to drive their wagons or carriages.
The small town I live in basically has only three ways in and out of it. It is next to freeway, and there are several roadside services available.
There are cameras located on the roads into and out of town.
Our police department post a crime summary on facebook each week. At least one stolen vehicle is recovered each week and often there are several.
When they stop the vehicle and do a search more often then not there are drugs and weapons in the vehicle.
These cameras are passive and are no more invasion of privacy then businesses (or homes) that have security cameras.
Personally I have two cameras on the front of my house, one covers the street in front and the second watches my front door.
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