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What is being searched and/or seized? The entire point of a license plate is that it's publicly readable, and US federal courts have consistently held that the

What is being searched and/or seized? The entire point of a license plate is that it's publicly readable, and US federal courts have consistently held that the exteriors of cars (and parts visible through windows) are not considered private spaces for the purposes of warrant requirements. That isn't to say that you can't make a good civic argument against increased public surveillance; only that the current practices are not meaningfully disputed as unconstitutional.

qingcharles 3y ago
U.S. v. Jones and Riley v. California aren't that clear cut. IIRC they both said that mass surveillance that would "out" people's private lives (e.g. going to a gay club) might cross the boundary into an unreasonable search.
NoMoreNicksLeft 3y ago
> The entire point of a license plate is that it's publicly readable Sure. By eyeballs. But when you install technology that makes the license plate a tracking device where they can map out your movements minute by minute as if you had some radio beacon hidden under the bumper, they're not "publicly reading" it. Why would the radio beacon be illegal without a warrant, but this be legal without it? They accomplish the same.
- lonelyasacloud 3y ago
  >Sure. By eyeballs So in terms of concern about the enforcement of bad laws surely the correct way to deal with those is in the legislative process, rather than on relying on gaps in human enforcement later on? Otherwise why artificially make law enforcement more inefficient?
  - NoMoreNicksLeft 3y ago
    > So in terms of concern about the enforcement of bad laws surely the correct way to deal with those is in the legislative process, rather than In emergency situations, you rely on whatever mechanisms are still partially functional. We're 0.003 milliseconds into the fatal crash, and here you are saying "but are we really going to rely on the airbags, shouldn't we fix the seat belts"? If this is what passes for insightful and mature for you, we're all fucking doomed. >Otherwise why artificially make law enforcement more inefficient? How exactly does one grow up thinking that the measurement they want to optimize for in law enforcement, above all others, is "efficiency"?
    - lonelyasacloud 3y ago
      > How exactly does one grow up thinking that the measurement they want to optimize for in law enforcement, above all others, is "efficiency"? Because one, it all comes from the same pot of money. What happens to training and selection budgets that weed out the racists, misogynists, bullies and the like. Those available for responding to violent crime, investigation of rapes and homicides etc when Police forces have to routinely expend their resources catching speeders and/or checking number plates? And two, because to name a few of the more well known dictators; Hitler, Stalin, Mao and more recently the Kim's, all did, or do just fine without number plate readers. If the technology is available, how much notice of any laws preventing its use are future dictators going to take anyway? Collectively wasting energy trying to ban number plate readers and the like will make zero difference to whether we end up living in dictatorships/police states. And in the meantime it is better to hold off society pushing in that direction by spending the money on things people care about.
      - NoMoreNicksLeft 3y ago
        >And two, because to name a few of the more well known dictators; Hitler, Stalin, Mao and more recently the Kim's, all did, or do just fine without number plate readers. We're all doomed. >What happens to training and selection budgets that weed out the racists, misogynists, bullies and the like. No such mechanisms exist. They were talked about during any planning sessions, they weren't requested or required by the legislators. They weren't designed, tested, or implemented. In fact, police academies and similar systems probably select for bullies, racists, and misogynists. I don't say this lightly, the few anecdotes that come out of those places certainly support the idea, and the results don't seem to contradict it in the slightest. Only a deliberately cultivated naivete and some serious distance from these institutions could have one believing such mechanisms exist.
- gnicholas 3y ago
  I have wondered about this. Would anyone feel differently — or should the law apply differently — to a system that enables remote workers to watch a video feed and write down all of the license plate numbers they see?
  - brokenmachine 3y ago
    That would cost a lot and therefore be limited in scale. Scale matters. Also, do you mean literally written down on paper, or entered into a database as an instantly searchable, permanent and AI analyzable record? The two are very different.
UncleEntity 3y ago
> A researcher who focuses on a range of surveillance technologies, Maass said he has a particular problem with license plate readers because every driver needs a tag to get on the road. It’s a requirement, he said, “that was not designed for this purpose.” “There’s not a lot you can do to protect yourself from them other than just stop driving,” Maass said. “They’re set up in this way that, in order for you to get to work and to travel freely, you have to submit to your data being monetized by a private company and then sold to law enforcement.” There's a few videos on the youtubes where perfectly law-abiding citizens were pulled out of their vehicles at gunpoint due to false positives from systems like this.

qingcharles 3y ago

U.S. v. Jones and Riley v. California aren't that clear cut. IIRC they both said that mass surveillance that would "out" people's private lives (e.g. going to a gay club) might cross the boundary into an unreasonable search.

NoMoreNicksLeft 3y ago

> The entire point of a license plate is that it's publicly readable Sure. By eyeballs. But when you install technology that makes the license plate a tracking device where they can map out your movements minute by minute as if you had some radio beacon hidden under the bumper, they're not "publicly reading" it. Why would the radio beacon be illegal without a warrant, but this be legal without it? They accomplish the same.

lonelyasacloud 3y ago
>Sure. By eyeballs So in terms of concern about the enforcement of bad laws surely the correct way to deal with those is in the legislative process, rather than on relying on gaps in human enforcement later on? Otherwise why artificially make law enforcement more inefficient?
- NoMoreNicksLeft 3y ago
  > So in terms of concern about the enforcement of bad laws surely the correct way to deal with those is in the legislative process, rather than In emergency situations, you rely on whatever mechanisms are still partially functional. We're 0.003 milliseconds into the fatal crash, and here you are saying "but are we really going to rely on the airbags, shouldn't we fix the seat belts"? If this is what passes for insightful and mature for you, we're all fucking doomed. >Otherwise why artificially make law enforcement more inefficient? How exactly does one grow up thinking that the measurement they want to optimize for in law enforcement, above all others, is "efficiency"?
  - lonelyasacloud 3y ago
    > How exactly does one grow up thinking that the measurement they want to optimize for in law enforcement, above all others, is "efficiency"? Because one, it all comes from the same pot of money. What happens to training and selection budgets that weed out the racists, misogynists, bullies and the like. Those available for responding to violent crime, investigation of rapes and homicides etc when Police forces have to routinely expend their resources catching speeders and/or checking number plates? And two, because to name a few of the more well known dictators; Hitler, Stalin, Mao and more recently the Kim's, all did, or do just fine without number plate readers. If the technology is available, how much notice of any laws preventing its use are future dictators going to take anyway? Collectively wasting energy trying to ban number plate readers and the like will make zero difference to whether we end up living in dictatorships/police states. And in the meantime it is better to hold off society pushing in that direction by spending the money on things people care about.
    - NoMoreNicksLeft 3y ago
      >And two, because to name a few of the more well known dictators; Hitler, Stalin, Mao and more recently the Kim's, all did, or do just fine without number plate readers. We're all doomed. >What happens to training and selection budgets that weed out the racists, misogynists, bullies and the like. No such mechanisms exist. They were talked about during any planning sessions, they weren't requested or required by the legislators. They weren't designed, tested, or implemented. In fact, police academies and similar systems probably select for bullies, racists, and misogynists. I don't say this lightly, the few anecdotes that come out of those places certainly support the idea, and the results don't seem to contradict it in the slightest. Only a deliberately cultivated naivete and some serious distance from these institutions could have one believing such mechanisms exist.
gnicholas 3y ago
I have wondered about this. Would anyone feel differently — or should the law apply differently — to a system that enables remote workers to watch a video feed and write down all of the license plate numbers they see?
- brokenmachine 3y ago
  That would cost a lot and therefore be limited in scale. Scale matters. Also, do you mean literally written down on paper, or entered into a database as an instantly searchable, permanent and AI analyzable record? The two are very different.

UncleEntity 3y ago

> A researcher who focuses on a range of surveillance technologies, Maass said he has a particular problem with license plate readers because every driver needs a tag to get on the road. It’s a requirement, he said, “that was not designed for this purpose.” “There’s not a lot you can do to protect yourself from them other than just stop driving,” Maass said. “They’re set up in this way that, in order for you to get to work and to travel freely, you have to submit to your data being monetized by a private company and then sold to law enforcement.” There's a few videos on the youtubes where perfectly law-abiding citizens were pulled out of their vehicles at gunpoint due to false positives from systems like this.