Pubdate: Fri, 30 Jan 2015
Source: Los Angeles Times (CA)
Copyright: 2015 Los Angeles Times
Contact:  http://www.latimes.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/248

THEY KNOW WHERE YOU'VE BEEN

The military calls it "mission creep" - sending troops out for one 
purpose, then adding to their marching orders over time. This kind of 
metastasis is innocuous in some contexts, but not so benign when the 
government is collecting information about innocent people going 
about their daily lives.

A perfect illustration is the Drug Enforcement Administration's 
expansive license-plate tracking program that privacy advocates 
brought to light this week. What began as an effort to confiscate 
guns and cash from drug traffickers heading to Mexico has reportedly 
expanded into a general purpose surveillance tool for law enforcement 
agencies that treats millions of ordinary Americans as potential suspects.

Much of what we know about licenseplate tracking comes from Freedom 
of Information Act requests filed by the American Civil Liberties 
Union, which has tried to raise awareness about the tracking systems 
operated by numerous local governments and private companies. 
Sophisticated cameras mounted along roadways or in parked cars record 
the plate number of every passing vehicle, then transmit the data to 
a central office for storage.

The DEA began tracking plates in the Southwestern U.S. more than six 
years ago, then expanded the effort across the country in 
collaboration with local police.

According to the Wall Street Journal, use of the data has expanded as 
well to support criminal investigations.

Defenders of plate-tracking argue that it's not technically an 
invasion of privacy for the government (or anyone else) to keep an 
eye peeled on the public streets.

And yet the same argument could be used to justify local police 
filming residents whenever they pull out of their driveways, 
analyzing and retaining a record of every trip they make. After all, 
if you're not doing anything wrong, you don't have anything to worry 
about, right?

Except possibly being asked to explain why you attended a perfectly 
legal gun show, which the DEA once contemplated using plate-readers to surveil.

There doesn't appear to be any limit on how the data may be used, and 
in the case of private companies' plate-tracking, few if any limits 
on how the long the information can be retained.

Law enforcement agencies say the platetracking systems have been 
valuable in generating leads and helping to capture suspects.

They're backed by banks, insurers and other companies that use 
private companies' tracking systems to find deadbeat borrowers, among 
other pursuits. But by secretly collecting a vast amount of data 
without disclosing why or limiting its potential use, and by allowing 
the creation of tracking logs that are kept for years, the government 
is trading away too much liberty in the name of security.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom