Holy shit. So you can just ask for anyone’s plate and the police will hand it out. That’s what their response says.
This is why license plates are so short, so no one gets the custom plate car'); DROP TABLE surveillanceState;
The government knows where you live and where you go pretty much all the time when you’re in a car. That includes your lifted pickup truck and your minivan covered top to bottom with words.
All yous conspiracy nuts out there, let’s advocate for better bike and passenger train infrastructure and walkable cities, to make it harder for governments to know where you are and track what you do, thanks.
I highly doubt the government knows where I go:
- older car with no smart crap
- red light and speed cameras are illegal in my state
- I use an alternative Android ROM on my phone with a firewall
That said, I totality agree with your assessment. We need better pedestrian, cycling, and mass transit infrastructure. The problem is that pretty much nobody campaigns on that. Rs campaign on fiscal issues, Ds campaign on “culture” issues, and neither deliver on their promises anyway. I want more trains and more pedestrian/cycling infra, but neither party seems to care…
But do you sanitize and vet your carrier data?
Triangulation using cellphone towers is not unheard of and they can subpoena it.
Then again, a national state actor going against a private entity is rare and the private entity will often lose.
Same thing with my home cameras, I use unifi because it’s easy and the data is stored locally. That way the police can’t subpoena Amazon or any of the big companies for their cloud data.
I’m being very facetious. Privacy is a losing battle. You fuckup once, you negate a lot of hard work.
-Sent on my stock Google Pixel lmfao
Yeah, I forgot about triangulation. But I highly doubt my government is routinely gathering triangulation data on citizens, and especially not generally law abiding citizens like me. I suppose I could use a faraday cage to guarantee no tracking, but that’s well in the “tin foil hat” category of paranoia.
I use GrapheneOS and disable location most of the time, and sensor access is disabled for most apps. My firewall only allows a handful of apps to access mobile data, and I disable mobile data entirely fairly frequently. I only use Google Play for a handful of services, and they’re in a separate profile so they get fully closed when I’m done with them.
The government could subpoena information about me, but I doubt they routinely collect the sort if information that my phone exposes.
red light and speed cameras are illegal in my state
License plate readers are not covered by those two bans. Trust me, they are everywhere in the states, and the technology/software to set them up is so easy, that a private citizen who was bored was able to build one. The various governments have much nicer setups.
Yes, those are legal, but pretty much limited to law enforcement and paid parking lots. Since police can’t issue citations based on video evidence alone, they’re not nearly as common here as elsewhere. Private businesses could probably grab that from security cameras (e.g. gas stations), but that should, in most cases, require a subpoena.
I rarely go places where license plate readers are common, so those data points are pretty few and far between. If I was running from the law, I’d certainly act differently, but the police have no reason to request a subpoena, so I’m unlikely to be tracked.
It is possible though, and I really don’t like that. But it’s just not likely.
Yes. The police could find me if they had a warrant, but they don’t and I’m not going to give them a reason to get one. My state doesn’t allow automatic use of license plate scanning equipment without reasonable suspicion, and police have to submit a report if they use it.
So I’m not worried about it. I’m not running from the police and acting like I am could give them reasonable suspicion, and that’s counter-productive.
- red light and speed cameras are illegal in my state
This doesn’t ban license plate reader cameras. My state also bans red light and speed cameras, but automatic license plate readers are 100% legal. I have seen the ALPL systems firsthand, and know they’re in use. You wouldn’t even notice them, because they’re mounted on traffic lights and power lines. It’s not like red light cameras, where they have a blatantly obvious giant camera box.
My local municipality 100% uses ALPLs, and has referenced them in a number of arrests recently. They’re mostly used for Amber Alert situations, where police already have a description of what to look for. In these cases, the ALPL will basically allow them to track the car in real time, without even needing to follow the car. Because they simply get updates every time the car passes an intersection, so they can set up a stop ahead of where the person is traveling.
Here’s the state code (Utah) on license plate readers:
Law Enforcement use of the ALPR systems is limited by 41-6a-2003 to:
(a) Apprehend an individual with an outstanding warrant;
(b) Locate a missing or endangered person;
© To enforce motor carrier laws, or
(d) To locate a stolen vehicle, or
(e) As part of an active criminal investigation.
(f) Troopers will not run ALPR data prior to, or during a traffic stop unless reasonable suspicion can be articulated for an active criminal investigation.
(g) Any time ALPR data is used, written documentation and a case number must be completed
It’s very possible the police have scanned my license plate, and imo that’s totally fine, provided my car is in public and one of the above apply.
From those:
- I have no warrants, so this doesn’t apply
- Could happen to anyone, but chances are very low
- I’m obviously not a commercial vehicle
- Possible, but unlikely. I drive old, crappy cars, so my car is unlikely to be similar to a stolen car.
- Again, possible, but I don’t commit crimes worth tracking via license plate. Any crimes I do commit would likely fall under traffic violations.
- I try very hard to not give police reasonable, articulable suspicion. If stopped, I give short answers and have yet to have a problem.
- Police are lazy, so they’re unlikely to use ALPR data unless they have a good reason. I intend to never give them that good reason.
I go after the low-hanging fruit so as to not arouse suspicion and protect me if there is suspicion. Going any further (e.g. trying to fool ALPR systems) goes against that. If I’m on public roads, I assume my car can be tracked, so I drive carefully and keep my car properly maintained. I also store any potential contraband out of view so as to not raise suspicion if I am stopped.
It would be nice to go even further, but I’m not going to break the law to try to hide, I’m going to blend in instead.
Still have triangulation from cell towers and probably others still even with the firewall. Do you have Gapps installed?
I have Gapps in a separate profile, which I almost never use. So 99% of the time, it’s not running.
And yeah, the government could find me if they had a warrant. I’m not running from the police, I’m trying to give them no reason to need to look for me. I’m more concerned about big tech tracking me and giving the government a reason to watch me, so that’s what I’m looking to avoid.
If I wanted to hide from governments, I would take a very different strategy.
They know where I am in my 1986 Fiero? In an area where the nearest traffic camera is at least 50 kms away? Where the police don’t show even if you call them?
Would I ride a train, sure but they are all freight haulers now and would you believe it even easier to track?
And my bicycle? its great, love it. but I am not able to make my 250km commute on it and although I have used it in the winter -50c is not conducive to cycling.
There is a record of you being the owner of a 1986 Fiero. Nobody needs to know the make, colour and serial number of your bike unless you register it in a system to ensure it’s not stolen.
US and Canadian Intercity trains have upped security since 9/11 like everything so there is more tracking than before. You can still buy tickets with cash at least. Denser cities make it easier to blend in the crowds.
And yeah my last car had no always connected tech bullshit, and if you live in a remote area then of course, mass-transit isn’t for you. Rural folks do also advocate for better city planning because it helps keep suburbanites out. Extreme cold and heat (beyond +/- 40 deg C) makes it hard but most winters and summers it can work
There is also a record of where I live, my height, eye colour and a whole list of things. People will still be able to find me on my bike easier then in my car since I can’t be that far from home on it.
You assume we all live in cities, we don’t. I like how my town is set up and is walking and bike friendly, but still most drive. This post was about privacy but you got on the ol’ soapbox about mass transit. Do you really think getting on a train/bus/tram you are not being/can not be tracked?
Leave your city, spread out and enjoy a bit of nature.
Try robbing a bank and get away in ur fiero and yeah the cops will find you the same day.
I believe that where I live the license plate numbers would also not be considered personal information. This might work here too, if a different exemption was not claimed, although I’m not aware of anyone using this technology near me.
Boo to paywall posts.
This is like walking into a newsagents and saying “Boo to paid newspapers”
Paywalls are as easy to bypass as it is to steal the newspaper and run away
Fair enough, in this instance the author is the cofounder, so while I’ll leave my comment to not hide that I’ve been corrected, he’s well within his rights to charge for his work.
What gets me is the more and more I see of this: https://lemm.ee/comment/12593815, where The Atlantic paywalls an article copublished with the authors public blog.
People like Doctorow are fortunate to have built their followings before you could game Google, but I wish there was a way to identify sources of content to overcome that, and drive traffic and ad revenue to the source, vs revenue to them via an intermediary.
