Boston Tracks Vehicles, Lies About It, Leaves Data Exposed

An anonymous reader writes: License plate readers have been in the news a lot lately for the invasion of privacy they represent. Boston is the latest city to make mistakes with the technology. Two weeks ago, a reporter realized that the City of Boston had accidentally exposed records for their automated license plate reader system online. Anyone could have downloaded "dozens of sensitive files, including hundreds of thousands of motor vehicle records dating back to 2012." What's worse is that the Boston Police Department claimed in 2013 that it had stopped using license plate readers. A look through the accidentally-public database shows "hundreds of emails" dating from 2013 to the present, indicating that the police were still getting that data with help from the Transportation Department.

Comments

the Patriots should come out and support

[turkeydance]

their brothers-in-cheating

The city LIED about it?

[sconeu]

I'm shocked, SHOCKED!!!!

Oh wait... How can you tell when a politician is lying? His lips move.

Re:The city LIED about it?

[Intron]

Don't worry, the government will investigate and punish the guilty. In this case it will be the reporter.

The old Lie by Omission

[BrookHarty]

Most counties do this, lie by omission. "We don’t spy on our citizens!" Correct, we allow other countries, then we swap data.
Police, "We don’t track license plates!", We let the DOT do it for us.

So many lies in government agencies.

"it stopped using..."

[Frobnicator]

Taking them at their word, let's assume the police department stopped using license plate scanners. They no longer own them, they sold them off, whatever.

That doesn't mean that a third party doesn't run the licence plate scanners and the police have a very cozy relationship for getting all the data whenever they need it.

It's much like the recent changes to the NSA's spying playbook. They say they will no longer collect and store that metadata themselves .... but they will use a third party to do it. In particular, that third party is not subject to the government's data retention policy limiting position of the metadata.

In both cases, it means the agency itself is no longer doing it. That doesn't mean it still isn't happening, just that the agency is not the one actively doing it.

Re:"it stopped using..."

[Anonymous Coward]

And this is where we all stop acknowledging the law anymore - it's pretty much useless at this point. The law is a big game where everyone tries to use sneaky underhanded games to redefine words, or redefine the scope of words. Basically we write a law and then tweak the language so we can ignore the law. We might as well not write laws in the first place and save the hassle. The mess that came out of Obamacare: Point at the word "Federal" (an implementation detail) and use that to derail the whole operation. Point at some hazy definition of what "Federal" can and can't do. Use that as a justification for denying healthcare. Whatever. At the same time send out American Community Surveys that are a complete violation of the constitution. Quote penal codes on the survey to make it sound extra scary. Even use the wrong penal codes or totally unrelated penal codes. There's no penalty when a government office lies, cheats or steals. See Civil Asset Forfeiture if you want to see some hot police stealing in action. Testimony obtained under duress? Plea bargaining? Nope...no penalty for bent police dealings and under-the-table sentencing.

That said, if I'm ever hauled in front of a judge for trying to be sneaky you're damn straight a judge is going to pound me into the ground for not following the "spirit" of the law. You see, politicians only have to follow the base language. Citizens have to follow the "spirit laws" as well. That means we have to guess what we're doing is somehow wrong by some random brain-fart interpretation and "not do that". If you think someone might take offense then just don't do it. Self censorship rules.

That said, if you're white, modestly well funded, and make at least a passing attempt at following the laws you can skip most of this. You can't follow all of the laws since some of them contradict and some of them are broad as all hell. The trick is to blag your way around it and never get arrested, never say anything in front of a cop, always nod and just go about your business. If you attract the ire of a cop then you're basically 100% fucked with no recourse. This is the system we've created now. That's why the headline here is to be expected. It's not unusual at all. Nothing will come of it and nothing will be done about it. Maybe some sap due for retirement will be retired a little earlier to placate the PR gods but that's about as much as we can expect.

Re:"it stopped using..."

[tomhath]

If anyone bothered to read the linked article they would see that this is exactly what it happening. Strictly speaking, the police stopped using scanners. But the Boston Transportation Department is still using them and (apparently) contracted with Xerox to manage a database, which the police seem to have access to. I suppose one could argue that use of data collected by scanners still constitutes use of the scanner.

Re:"it stopped using..."

[sjames]

Actually, it is stalking. Seeing someone in a public place is fine. Seeing them occasionally is OK. Making sure you see them every time in many places without their consent is stalking.

So the real question is...

[Anonymous Coward]

Is anyone going to be charged, arrested, jailed, or even fired or fined for this act of blatant spying and the attempted coverup? My answer is, only if these leaked records embarrass a high-ranking policeman or government official (eg, their wife thinks they go bowling every Friday night, but the records show them actually going to a gay bar).

Re:So the real question is...

[Dereck1701]

There already was a pretty embarrassing episode in this very city, which is the reason why the Boston police had to "shut down" the program. That incident, if I recall correctly, involved public release of a very limited database in an attempt to allay to privacy concerns. Even with this extremely hobbled database researchers were able to find multiple embarrassing events, firstly that the area with the highest recorded density of vehicles with outstanding parking tickets was the police parking lot. Secondly that at least one stolen vehicle had went past the same intersection time and time again at a predictable time and day and no one ever thought post a cruiser to retrieve it and arrest the thief.

All data becomes noise @ some collection threshold

[rmdingler]

One motorcycle that had been reported stolen triggered scanner alerts 59 times over six months, while another plate with lapsed insurance was scanned a total of 97 times in the same span.

We are going to be partially rescued from the data collection efforts; not from conscience or court ruling,

but for the sheer, greedy mass of collections.

Re:All data becomes noise @ some collection thresh

[Anonymous Coward]

If you believe this, you're a moron. The whole point is that they can selectively go back and pin things on you while they're on a which hunt / fishing expedition.

Re:All data becomes noise @ some collection thresh

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm undoing all my moderation to post this, but to anyone who thinks "what a conspiratard!" they should be asking themselves what the point of all this collection was if they weren't using this to find stolen vehicles or uninsured motorists.

Re:Oh look

[spacepimp]

I wish people would stop with the nickelodeon party line bullshit: That other political party is bad, they are eroding your civil liberties!!!.
Republicans and Democrats are both complicit. The depressingly small number of privacy protecting politicians defies party lines... People need to stop pretending their party is looking out for civil liberties. They aren't and you're still buying their lies, and pointing fingers. Until all sides are accountable they will play this finger wag game, because people like you fall for it.

Re:All data becomes noise @ some collection thresh

[phantomfive]

To measure which streets are the most congested?

They have traffic counting hoses for that. No need to have a complex system to measure traffic congestion.

Re:Oh look

[DNS-and-BIND]

There needs to be a name for this rule, because this happens all the time on Slashdot. Whenever an (R) does something despicable, it is proof positive that their party is horrible and needs to be disbanded for the good of the world. Whenever a (D) does something despicable, we all need to look past party lines and realize that both parties are bad. Conclusion: we can't criticize (D) but it is A-OK to criticize (R). I have seen this comment appear so many times, and it never appears on stories that feature (R).