Slashdot Mirror
ICE Is About To Start Tracking License Plates Across the US
Presto Vivace shares a report from The Verge: The Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency has officially gained agency-wide access to a nationwide license plate recognition database, according to a contract finalized earlier this month. The system gives the agency access to billions of license plate records and new powers of real-time location tracking, raising significant concerns from civil libertarians. The source of the data is not named in the contract, but an ICE representative said the data came from Vigilant Solutions, the leading network for license plate recognition data. While it collects few photos itself, Vigilant Solutions has amassed a database of more than 2 billion license plate photos by ingesting data from partners like vehicle repossession agencies and other private groups. ICE agents would be able to query that database in two ways. A historical search would turn up every place a given license plate has been spotted in the last five years, a detailed record of the target's movements. That data could be used to find a given subject's residence or even identify associates if a given car is regularly spotted in a specific parking lot.
Presto Vivace adds, "This will not end well."
I wanted a new license plate anyway.
I guess I won't be the only one.
Foolish public, you don't think this isn't already being done by some other government agency.
What about all the fake temp plates? In Texas we are having a major problem with them, some one just buys a bunch of temp plays and that is not going to track to any one. So again great idea, but would only work if every ones plays by the rules, but if every one plays by the rules we would not need this.
I ride my bike and garage my car most of the time you insensitive clod.
Can't wait till get have to have our papers on us every time we travel. Maybe we can give arm bands to identify those we are supposed to be scared of?
How fortunate that there is no way to blackmail people based on where they go (to a mistress's, to a gay bar, to a fetlife meetup, to a Scientology convention)... and that this information could never be abused by authoritarian governments (identifying who drives to Temple or who doesn't drive during Jewish holy times) or for warrantless surveillance of an entire population for criminality (you have a really regular schedule of driving given that you don't have a work visa...). Dollars to donuts they never use it for enforcing restraining orders and other things that seriously affect lives in a positive way.
If you really value liberty and freedom, repeal the law requiring license plates be displayed on all vehicles until this type of record-keeping is stopped at the federal level.
You track my every financial transaction to protect me from unfair something something. You want to give the whole Internet an anal exam to protect me from Russian propaganda. But let ICE try to enforce immigration laws and it's "oh noes!11 they're spying on me."
Selective outrage. Nothing more.
All are tools used against you. Deny them.
Lots of useful ways to use license plate data when you can cross-reference it with the illegal things states are doing (demon weed). Time to reign in these out of control states and the GOP is just the party to do way with states rights. #MAGA
Z2ZZ22Z or any combo of Z and 2.
What that really means is that license plates have been tracked for several decades and they decided to do some centralization upgrades and to make it official. That also means license plate databases have been used for several decades and at some point it became painful to use it the court of law, since some judges may decide that such tracking is not "appropriate".
We have a specific Right of Privacy in this state.
You can't even put a GPS locator on a car without a specific INDIVIDUAL court order by a JUDGE here.
This is a clear violation.
Expect to be sued - successfully - by our State Attorney General.
He's 22 for 22 so far.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
And you know how she ended up.
What's next? Random arrests to administer loyalty tests? Always be sure to carry enough cash to bribe the secret police? Getting your door kicked in in the middle of the night, black-bagged, and dragged off to be interrogated? Have your family threatened, unless you sign a 'confession' for something you have nothing to do with?
THANKS, TRUMP!
So, state law requires a valid registration plate. But there's nothing preventing someone from putting a dozen other, different ones, on their car as long as the legit one is displayed (free speech!).
yeah of course you won't attract ANY attention from the cops when you do that, they won't pull you over, they won't ask for your id, they won't use your shady behavior as an excuse to search your car and your home, no indeed they won't do any of those things
They have your face ID, your phone, your car, your fingerprints, your Iris scan, your very DNA. Papers is such a twentieth century idea.
And note that the query that they can ask is "Who has been near these people", or even, "which groups of people have been near each other".
And it is all being gathered by private companies that are not accountable.
ICE agents just pulled my car over and seized my license plate. Apparently it didn't pass inspection. It's in the mail back to Canada now.
But no, this is the real problem.
Tracking criminals as they move across the country.
That's what some of (not all*) of our law enforcement in this country is turning into, and I in part** blame Trump for this. Haivng the Pussy-grabber-in-chief sitting in the Whitehouse has brought some of the worst kinds of people out of the shadows, emboldened them.
* I am not going to claim that all police are jackbooted thugs; some genuinely believe in law-and-order, and want to help people.
** I'm also not going to lay 100% of the blame on Trump; many of his predecessors have contributed to this problem and/or set the stage for things that are manifesting now. Trump however appears to be the catalyst in many cases.
We have a database of cars and license plates driven by ICE staff, and we track where they go, too.
The interesting thing about this news is the datasource is not the State Registrations as one might expect. ICE is using "private" scans most likely because a significant number of state laws prevent them "fishing" and require probable cause for access. I bet much of those "private" DBs are from toll authorities, AFAIK all of which have enabling legislation. Watch for new laws restricting toll authorities, much like public outcry clamped down of State Registration searches.
I know in California the plate goes with car, so if you sell your car and buy a new one, you will have a new plate number that is not in the database. I don't know if that works for other states, but probably most of them are like this. So if you can afford it, buy a new car every year. If you buy a used car you at least reset the tracking done on you buy perhaps inherit some stale data of the previous owner. Which might be good if you find the idea of SWAT and ICE busting into your home to be thrilling.
Another thought is rent a car or only use ride sharing apps. Also bicycles aren't plated in the US, at least not with ids that can be easily spotted by these camera systems. Electric-assist bicycle today can go 30mph+ without pedalling if you illegally unlock their simple limiters.
Most complete solution would be not to elect fuckwits who think spying on every American citizen is acceptable. Our legislature controls the purse strings of these departments, as well as the general rules that regulate businesses collecting and selling this information. They have the power to fix this, but choose a pay off instead. I guess because businesses are people too, and every dollar you contribute is worth a vote.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
my county just charged $70k to my city to install license plate readers the the city exits....
And unless you are native american, can't wait to see your ass put back on the boat and sent away.
because that seems to be the thing the Illegals in Dallas use to avoid the system. Look around next time you are driving, and see if the POS beater next to you at the light has paper dealer tags. Yeah that junker with the busted out light and the dished-in quarter panel came fresh off the lot. Better yet, if Jose gets in a wreck while intoxicated, he will jump out and run like hell, because he doesn't have a license or insurance either. Tough luck if you're the victim - He's just dreaming of a better life in El Norte.
For example, make it visible/readable from car-level only, so that cops can see it, but block out cameras on poles above and from the sides? For instance, a deep louver system would probably do the trick. Or perhaps some of those wild stickers to at least fool computer vision like was reported on a story here a couple of weeks back, so that this couldn't be automated?
It seems high time for someone to start working on devices to do this, if it's not already illegal to install one.
Go ICE, round 'em up, ship 'em out!
It's too late for that (and is illegal). The only thing you can do if you need a car is to call a taxi (not Uber) and pay in cash. Of course they can backtrack the taxis to the company and the phone records to the company. If you call a few times for unscheduled pickups they can roughly link the call times to when a taxi shows up at a specific location and figure out who is using it and going where. You'll need to always change locations, phones, or use scheduled pickups.
If you use a "ride-sharing" app, they can simply directly track you so you've lost before you even go anywhere.
*By "they" I mean anyone who can get their hands on the data and has taken an into to data mining class.
The papers (or rather lack thereof) is just for probable cause. They know the owner's license and registration before stepping out of the patrol car so demanding paper validation of it is either to give them a ticketing opportunity or probable cause to search your car.
And no, they didn't tell me this directly, it was figured out over two separate stops when I had my papers ready to show the officer and he dismissed them as 'I already have your information', and the following stop where I didn't have my papers and they tried to make the excuse that they didn't have the information.
And unless you are native american, can't wait to see your ass put back on the boat and sent away.
We are not immigrants. We took this land by force and that's the only way to keep it.
There is a reflective coating spray you can use to make cameras unable to see the plates.
Were doomed and there is no new America to stop it this time.
So in other words, you're an asshole.
Simply break no laws and you will be free from worry about being tracked. It also helps if you are not lying to a wife or whatever. The Truth may set you free in more ways than one.
Mmm meaty fascist dick taste! You love it dont you?
How can an internal combustion engine track license plates?
#DeleteFacebook
License plates are a threat to democracy and we should get rid of them explicitly because they enable bad actors like governments and others to track us and suppress freedom of speech. I've seen this technology utilized against activists and it's scary.
I saw one activist who was not known by the police arrested while filming (ie he didn't drive through the checkpoint and was on a public side walk near but far enough away he couldn't be easily seen) an unconscionable and arguably illegal police check point. His arrest was over some trivial vehicle motor vehicle violation (he was protesting drivers licenses)- but the real reason he was "caught" or investigated was because the cops don't like us filming them particularly when they are clearly violating peoples rights- in this case targeting young drivers and minorities. The cops were clearly outside the authority of the law and the boundaries for which the exception under which they were even allowed to be operating. The courts have basically granted an 'exception' to the constitution that otherwise prohibits unwarranted searches and seizures for "safety" (yet somehow there are near 0 arrests for DUI in spite of hundreds of these things in the state and lots of arrests or citations for petty and victimless "crimes" despite that they are suppose to be limiting the checkpoints to DUI). You think it can't happen here. The reality is it's already happening here. Tyranny exists- it just isn't impacting you yet. None of the politicians in power were inconvenienced by the 30 minute long stops that many young and minority drivers have encountered. Yet even I was arrested for "crossing the street" despite breaking no law and having never gotten anything other than a questionable speeding ticket for going 5 over in a 40 mph zone. Thousands of dollars later the charges were dropped just hours before trial. I know lots of other activists who have also been targeted similarly. Another friend in activism was arrested for filing a complaint against a police officer- yea- the courts have ruled it doesn't even matter if you lied in the complaint as you can't be held liable because it would have a dangerous impact on people's ability and fear of reporting criminal actions of police- so the only purpose of this is to target a significant activist (and the complaint was 100% true- and we even have video of an assault by the officer in question- though no arrest was made until *after* a complaint was filed and it was for filing the complaint purely because the officer disputed the claim).
I've also seen people accused of child porn, rape, and other sex crimes without any foundation for the sole purpose of undermining or attempting to undermine activists (and no conviction or trial ever even occurs even after *YEARS* have passed, but of course the 10s of thousands of dollars of stolen equipment are not returned). In one case there was no evidence and the FBI knew it and there is reason to believe the FBI lied to get the warrant in the first place. They simply utilized it as a smear campaign calling up the news stations and informing them of a raid on an activist center and radio studio. The activist center of course wasn't called an activist center and the radio show operated out of the other side of the building wasn't mentioned nor were the other tenants in the building who were all sharing the same internet connection. The FBI targeted the person whose name was on the internet connection because he is a leading activist and has a international syndicated radio show where one of his co-hosts attacked the FBI two weeks prior for distributing child porn!!! The FBI was being hypocritical for distributing child porn and at the same time claiming child porn hurts children. Well- OK- so that means you are HARMING CHILDREN UNDER YOUR OWN LOGIC!!!! Whether his opinion was right or wrong the FBI had no business raiding the studio- which was in clear retaliation over it. When you are on hundreds of radio stations across the United States and are the only people willing to call out the FBI for its hypocrisy.. you get targeted. Ohh and the FBI actually improved the speed and added servers for the child porn site they were distributing child porn through.
So, violent thieves then, how very American, at least you admit it.
Good riddance to law-breakers. You can also move to Canada if you have an issue with the laws in the US. Pathetic.
We have a specific Right of Privacy in this state.
You can't even put a GPS locator on a car without a specific INDIVIDUAL court order by a JUDGE here.
This is a clear violation.
Expect to be sued - successfully - by our State Attorney General.
He's 22 for 22 so far.
So you don't like a powerful central government?
Well, then, quit voting for politicians that want to "solve problems" or "have everyone pay their fair share".
Because this is what you get when you give a government more power and/or more resources.
But you vote for Democrats, don't you?
Why the fuck are you surprised that a powerful government isn't your friend?
No, deporting people and breaking up families is pathetic. Is that the best solution your tiny little brain can come up with?
I spent an uncomfortable day in court, because a seller had placed a license plate on a truck that did not belong to it, and I did not remove it prior to driving it home post purchase. I was 16. I was stopped by an officer, and given tickets for a 'stolen license plate, stolen license tags,' and hilariously, a fine for the 'stolen' registrations being expired. I was also given a ticket for failing to have registered the vehicle and providing insurance.
During court, the judge determined that yes, I was guilty of the driving a vehicle under the above conditions. However, the judge determined that the law allows one to drive a vehicle home post purchase, and this conflicts with the requirement of having posted registration information.
The critical error on my part, had been to leave the old markings on the vehicle. Therefore, I was fined $1 for each transgression. These did not add 'points' to my license.
I do not suggest putting any false information on your vehicle, to further the parent's message.
Seriously, what value does ICE tracking LP give America's ability to secure itself? Absolutely NONE.
I do not mind giving SOME help to LEOs by POTENTIALLY hurting our rights, but only when it is about national security.
This is not. There is little to nothing in this that helps national security.
This should absolutely not be allowed.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Appropriately designed LCD/LED/E-paper screens with continuously changing license plate configurations.
No, deporting people and breaking up families is pathetic. Is that the best solution your tiny little brain can come up with?
By that logic we couldn't put anyone in jail for any crime, as that would break up families too.
Who broke up the family? It wasn't the law enforcers, it was the family member that broke the law. The law is clear, if you break the law then you will be detained. This is not a secret, they knew this possibility beforehand. If these people don't want to see their family broke up then DO NOT BREAK THE LAW!
In the case of deportation the solution of keeping the family together is far simpler, they can all go together. If a family member is a US citizen, such as a child of immigrants born here or an illegal alien marrying a citizen, then they are free to leave the country too. If for some reason the nation that the immigrant is from will not allow the family to enter then I'd suggest finding a different nation to immigrate to. They don't have to go home, but they can't stay here.
Is "think of the children" all your little brain can come up with?
We can think of the children and deport those that immigrated illegally. If the parent is so irresponsible and careless of their child's future to come to the USA illegally then it may be best for the child to be removed from the parent. Put the child up for adoption. Living in constant fear of deportation, evading the law to get employment, and generally living every day as a criminal is not setting this child up for success. Again, the parent put the child in this situation, it's not the fault of the government if enforcement of the law breaks up the family.
I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
How long will such tracking continue before people decide to rip off their license plates in mass numbers? The government can only track license plates if they exist.
People will make the claim that we need license plates, licenses to drive, and so on, so that if someone runs over some kid on a bicycle then we can track them down and have them arrested. Well, this is the price you pay for those tiny fractions of crimes that might go unsolved, you have a government that can track you everywhere you go, every dollar you spend, and every breath you take. The government claims these license plates are for our safety, that if we didn't have them then unsafe drivers could not be removed from the road.
Make up your minds. Do you want freedom or safety? You can't have both.
I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
No.
Advertisement: Are you a Gov't agency and want to know where a license plate has been? Are you bogged down by all of those stupid rules and regulations? We have a solution! Ask ICE!