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"Smart Plates" Could Betray California Drivers' Privacy
An anonymous reader writes with news that a California Senate Bill would authorize the state's Department of Motor Vehicles to test a digital registration plate system patented by San Francisco-based Smart Plate Mobile on as many as 160,000 cars. An article on the proposed trial in the Modesto Bee says, in part:
"The state hopes the technology will improve efficiencies in vehicle registrations and potentially save the DMV some of the $20 million spent each year in postage for renewals. Privacy advocates say the approach could leave motorists vulnerable to government surveillance by undoing a Supreme Court ruling that required authorities to obtain search warrants before using vehicle tracking devices. 'It means everyone driving in California will have their location accessible to the government at any time,' said Nate Cardozo, a staff attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation. In 2010, the Legislature considered a similar bill supported by Smart Plate Mobile, with the noted addition of allowing for scrolling advertisements when a vehicle comes to a stop for four seconds or longer." If only it took smart plates to track you.
While I'm not wild about being tracked, I simply don't feel that I have an assumption of privacy while driving around on a public road.
"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
I'd love the police to just be able to scan vehicles to see which are active, which plates do not match vehicles and which vehicles have insurance.
We are plagued by people who do not have valid registrations, borrow or steal plates and have no insurance.
Bust 'em on the spot.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
If you can root your license plate, does it affect your wanted level?
Well, now I've seen everything. Time to hang it up and get off this crazy thing they call the "Interwebs".
Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
who here thinks that licensure and displayed serial numbering EVER intended to protect privacy?
"Name Tags" could betray anonymity!
As one example of how police wanted to share this info... A CHP car is sitting at a ramp, tracking cars going by, all doing the speed limit, but posting the info to central computer. Another CHP car is sitting 20 miles down the highway at another ramp, scanning cars coming by and comparing time and information held in the central computer. Simple math and you find who has been speeding between points.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
" potentially save the DMV some of the $20 million spent each year in postage for renewals."
Why would it safe the DMV money. Isn't that paid for when you pay for the registration anyways as part of the fee/tax?
I have no issue with it, but the savings should be passed to those paying the bills, not for the govt to keep. But they love taking and keeping our money.
There are no loopholes. It's either legal or it's not.
I have a question for you.
Do you type your postings in a foreign (non-western European at that) language in Google Translate, then paste the results here?
If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
Where does the power come from for these scrolling advertisements? Will be owner be required to supply a wiring kit to hook it up? Otherwise, how long would a battery last; in an LA traffic jam these plates are going to be running ads for hours at a time.
It's racist to assume that people violating the law are a particular race. You just have to stop thinking altogether, or you're racist.
It's the data collection process and what is used with that data. With Data Mining techniques getting more sophisticated any tracking or automated data collection process, such as license plate scanners erode our privacy. Sure, if you have outstanding tickets or a warrant out for your arrest, an automated system for identifying your vehicle would be beneficial however we start casting bigger and bigger fishing nets and a lot of innocent fish get caught by the same net. How do you ensure that all that data for non-offenders gets removed or does it become another source of information that the government can use to track you? How often were you parked on this street? Oh we say you go over a bridge 50 times? It's a fine line that we cross in the names of efficiencies brought to bear to "reduce costs." There's already a report that the IRS has a system that allows state governments to access private information in the name of efficiency even though nobody in Congress has ever apparently approved such a system.
Harrison's Postulate - "For every action there is an equal and opposite criticism"
I for one would love to have a smart license plate. Just think of the hacking opportunities!
Jailbreak your license plate and display snarky messages to the other drivers on the road. Change your state to "confusion". Temporarily change your plate number and see how many red light cameras you can trip in a row. "Borrow" your rude neighbor's id and run up their toll bill. Steal a smart plate and hack it so you don't have to pay to register your vehicle. The possibilities are endless.
Any "smart" whatever can and will be hacked. If the incentives are large enough, those hacks will get widely distributed and used. How many incidents of license plate hacking will it take before the police decide it's just an expensive way to enable smart criminals? Not too many, I'd guess.
http://www.infowars.com/special-license-plates-shield-officials-from-traffic-tickets/
California Department of Motor Vehicles' "Confidential Records Program," which was created 30 years ago to keep DMV records of police officers private from criminals. The program has since expanded to cover "hundreds of thousands of public employees - from police dispatchers to museum guards - who face little threat from the public. Their spouses and children can get the plates, too.
As far as I know, the police are legally prohibited from using many of those kinds of tools.
I'm setting the wayback machine for more years than I should, but I recall being told they used to do exactly this at the toll booths. You'd get a toll slip stating the time when you entered the turnpike, you'd drive the road, then when you paid your toll, the cashier would look at the timestamp. If you arrived before it could have been possible had you been following the posted speed limit, a nearby cop walked up to the booth and you were handed a speeding ticket. As you approached a tollbooth at the end of a long stretch of a turnpike, it was apparently common to see cars parked on the side of the road, waiting for the clock to run down so they wouldn't get a ticket.
Eventually it was contested in court, and it was determined that because the police officer didn't actually witness you at the time you took the toll slip as well as the time you turned it in, he had no proof you were the driver during the time when the speeding event occurred so the ticket was invalid. For a similar reason, the old "ribbon radar" speed traps that local police used to set in small towns were contested and ultimately thrown out. I think these practices were ended sometime in the 1960s.
John
Citation needed. I'm a former PI and have never heard of such a thing.
I know of two things PIs are allowed to do:
Charge for investigative services
In specific circumstances, contract with a bondsman to apprehend their fugitive