Worried about surveillance, states enact privacy laws and restrict license plate readers

As part of its deportation efforts, the Trump administration ordered states to hand over personal data from voter rolls, driver’s license records and programs such as Medicaid and food stamps.

At the same time, the administration is trying to consolidate the bits of personal data held across federal agencies, creating a single trove of information on people who live in the United States.

Many left-leaning states and cities seek to protect their residents’ personal information amid the immigration crackdown. Now, a growing number of conservative lawmakers also want to curb use of surveillance technologies that can be used to identify and track people.

Conservative-led states such as Arkansas, Idaho and Montana enacted laws last year designed to protect the personal data collected through automated license plate readers and other means. They joined at least five left-leaning states — Illinois, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New York and Washington — that blocked U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement from accessing their driver’s license records.

In addition, Democratic-led cities in Colorado, Illinois, Massachusetts, New York, North Carolina, Texas and Washington last year terminated their contracts with Flock Safety, the largest provider of license plate readers in the U.S.

The Trump administration’s goal is to create a “surveillance dragnet across the country,” said William Owen, communications director at the Surveillance Technology Oversight Project, a nonprofit that advocates for stronger privacy laws.

“We’re entering an increasingly dystopian era of high-tech surveillance,” he said. Intelligence sharing between various levels of government, he said, “allowed ICE to sidestep sanctuary laws and co-opt local police databases and surveillance tools, including license plate readers, facial recognition and other technologies.”

A new Montana law bars government entities from accessing electronic communications and related material without a warrant. Republican state Sen. Daniel Emrich, the law’s author, said “the most important thing that our entire justice system is based on is the principle against unlawful search and seizure” — the right enshrined in the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

ICE did not respond to requests for comment.

Automated license plate readers

Recently, cities and states grew concerned over the use of automated license plate readers — high-speed camera and computer systems that capture license plate information on vehicles that drive by. The devices sit on top of police cars and streetlights or can be hidden in construction barrels and utility poles.

Some cameras collect data that gets stored in databases for years, raising concerns among privacy advocates. One report from the Brennan Center for Justice, a progressive think tank at New York University, found the data can be susceptible to hacking. Different agencies have varying policies on how long they keep the data, according to the International Association of Chiefs of Police, a law enforcement advocacy group.

Back to homepage

Subscriber Login

Keep reading with a digital access subscription.

Subscribe now

Supporters of the technology, including many in law enforcement, say the technology is a powerful tool for tracking down criminal suspects.

Government-politics

George Floyd and Renee Good: 5 years between Minneapolis videos, and confusion increased

• DAVID BAUDER Associated Press

Flock Safety says it has cameras in more than 5,000 communities and is connected to more than 4,800 law enforcement agencies across 49 states. The company claims its cameras conduct more than 20 billion license plate reads a month. It collects the data and gives it to police departments, which use the information to locate people.

Holly Beilin, a spokesperson for Flock Safety, said while some police agencies may be working with ICE, the company does not have a contractual relationship with the agency. Beilin also said many liberal and even sanctuary cities continue to sign contracts with Flock Safety. She noted the cameras were used to solve high-profile crimes, including identifying and leading police to the man who committed the Brown University shooting and killed an MIT professor at the end of last year.

“Agencies and cities are very much able to use this technology in a way that complies with their values. So they do not have to share data out of state,” Beilin said.

Nation & World

Minneapolis ICE shooting brings debate over moving vehicles back in focus

• CLAUDIA LAUER Associated Press

Pushback over data’s use

Critics, such as the American Civil Liberties Union, say Flock Safety’s cameras are not only “giving even the smallest-town police chief access to an enormously powerful driver-surveillance tool,” but ICE uses the data. One news outlet, 404 Media, obtained records of these searches and found many were carried out by local officers on behalf of ICE.

Last spring, the Denver City Council unanimously voted to terminate its contract with Flock Safety, but Democratic Mayor Mike Johnston unilaterally extended the contract in October, arguing the technology is a useful crime-fighting tool.

The ACLU of Colorado vehemently opposed the cameras, saying last August that audit logs from the Denver Police Department show more than 1,400 searches were conducted for ICE since June 2024.

“The conversation has really gotten bigger because of the federal landscape and the focus, not only on immigrants and the functionality of ICE right now, but also on the side of really trying to reduce and or eliminate protections in regards to access to reproductive care and gender affirming care,” Anaya Robinson, public policy director at the ACLU of Colorado.

“When we erode rights and access for a particular community, it’s just a matter of time before that erosion starts to touch other communities.”

Anti-ICE nationwide protests in photos