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- Hacker News
- There is another middle option that I would have liked to see the author discuss: requiring either a case number or a CAD ID, instead of a "search reason".
In my conversations with law enforcement (mostly at management level, chiefs of police), all of them have had reasonable-sounding objections to a warrant requirement for a search, but zero of them have been able to come up with a reason why a case-or-CAD ID requirement isn't workable. Generally, they argue that in practice obtaining a warrant can be too onerous in time sensitive situations, and can be harder to obtain than the public realizes. Two popular examples are in kidnappings (time sensitive) and missing persons (difficult to obtain).
A case number or CAD ID however simply requires that the details of either a public call for service or an active investigation are associated with the historical search. It closes the door on officers' hobby searching.
Andrew's blog post does note the problems with oversight, which also match my experience, so this isn't a perfect fix. But it will go further in conversations with law enforcement for people that are trying to thread the needle on making "safe" mass surveillance.
(I am personally opposed to mass surveillance in all its forms, but arguing only from that position pretty much immediately excludes me from policy discussions.)
by thaumaturgy - Yeah but that is the exact purpose of the warrant. It's suppose to add friction so you can't do this exact thing, even if it's useful and faster not to.by smalltorch
- This is already the current status quo on paper. I bet the majority of the cases IJ identified of mis-use the PDs already had this policy. (That is the same standard when you do a background criminal history check in New York, need to put in a case number, FYI.)
I did not want to go into too many technical details on the post -- I think you could do an AI audit at the point in time of the search query to prevent people putting in junk cases. That said I believe there will always need to be third party audits at a minimum.
Part of the issue is policies on paper are not effectively enforced. So people saying "just have policy X to prevent abuse" is a non-answer.
I wrote the post mainly because people arguing for limited data retention I think is bad for both sides -- it neither protects civil liberties and simultaneously makes it harder for long term criminal investigations.
by apwheele - A warrant isn't an effective safe guard unless you trust the government to only prosecute actual crimes. The US federal government has demonstrated, explicitly, that it is willing to use law enforcement for political ends and will charge private citizens for political reasons (like the reflecting pool case).
Now is not the time to be giving more power to the executive or its policing functions.
by carefulfungi - Any idea why this is so much less acceptable to people in the US than in the UK? In the UK we've had ANPR for more than twenty years and AFAICT there's no mass controversy surrounding it. It catches people with no licence, no insurance, who are wanted in various serious crimes. I'm surprised at the difference in attitude.
(I am aware that the UK has a less-than-stellar privacy track record... but nonetheless it's curious that for this particular technology, as opposed to the Online Safety Act, there's such a difference.)
by henryaj - Because we value freedom above all else, thankfully.
- It's mass surveillance that people can feel. Combined with ICE using it.
Our police overlords are not so polite.
In the UK there's severe limitations on freedom of speech, which would never be accepted in the US. The countries have very different values.
by Cider9986 - I was just reading a detective novel set in Michigan..apparently in that state at least, private investigators can look up plates just by calling the Sec of State's office and giving their badge number. Seems like it wouldn't take much to get a company designated in a similar way.by johnsmth
- >Any idea why this is so much less acceptable to people in the US than in the UK?
The US had only about a hundred years to get used to bending over and taking it from a government that doesn't really represent the people whereas the British have just shy of a thousand. So of course the US is more uppity.
- The US has (especially recently) shown that "community aligned behavior" and "what those in power do" are very different.
The US has also shown that the probability of someone being held accountable for massive abuse of power is essentially 0. This also means that the main disincentive for abusing power (getting caught and punished in some way) is a moot point.
People generally don't object to technology being used to fine mass shooters, or terrorists, or bank robbers. They do object to the same technology being used to stalk women that Texas thinks might be trying to get an abortion, or ensure that minorities stay out of the "white neighborhoods". One of these examples is a real thing, the other is what people are (reasonably) afraid of.
by nrmitchi - I believe they've also been in the US for 20 years. However, they aren't centralized like Flock. Flock cameras also all look the same so it's more present and in people's faces. The opposition to these is really heating up right now.by grubbs
- There's a fundamental question: Is it legal for the government to blanket a public space in cameras and do whatever they want to the data that they collect from those cameras?
Is it legal for a private entity to do the same with their owned space (like a plaza or mall or office tower)?
Focusing on license-plate-readers seems like car-brain is causing the author to miss the forest for the trees.
by Pxtl - You should raise your voices now. For Indians, its too late. Our Indian Government used facial recognition system at mass level in recent students protests and now police is showing up on their homes.
It's better to raise the voice now for you guys than to say sorry later.
by gagan2020 - Good article. It's a sober look at where we are at.
We lost a lot of strong privacy rights we had with landlines when we shifted to cell phones.
We're actually slowly creeping into pre-crime territory. You could have AI searching for possible pre-crime candidates based on unknown identity in the area, disparate pattern to usually movements, etc.
by throw7 - by GrinningFool
- This is a hole in the Constitution that would be better patched, at least with statute, better with an amendment. The fourth amendment says
Who is "their" here? In terms of property rights it's the people who own those digital "papers". The individuals who that data is about do no maintain or control that data, and could not destroy it, meaning they do not functionally have property rights over it. If I write in my notebook that you have blonde hair, the notebook is still my property. There isn't anything I could write about you in it that would make it yours (other than maybe "I hereby give this notebook to Joe Bloe").The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects...Attempts to interpret the Constitution otherwise are, IMHO, attempts at good policy, but unstable as law. So we should fix it either by giving people property rights to that data (so that they can destroy or change it without permission) or to explicitly require warrants for access to PII owned by third parties.
by delichon - Have fun writing a legal definition that accomplishes what you want but doesn't bar the police from creating a composite sketch from witness descriptions.by zahlman
- I would love an amendment that adds communications and movements to that listby esmIII
- These cameras are in public, where expectation of privacy has been ruled against a zillion times.
Go against this, and filming your kids baseball game becomes a legal nightmare.
by WarmWash
It was an attempt to secure privacy. "Their" means an individual, a person. Essentially, you control what you control, and do not need to give up this control unless there is suspicion of crime...."and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."by 1970-01-01- I don't like the article's tone of inevitability:
> I think cameras in all public spaces are going to happen. Imagine Ring comes out with a nicer camera system for homeowners....
Indiscriminately filming people in public places is illegal some places, e.g. Germany. Allowing the creation of large networks of cameras surveilling public places is a choice.
by Zak - It's a bit more of a gray area in the US, where expectations of privacy in public spaces has been ruled against many times over. When in a public space, you are allowed to film or photograph whomever you want. This likewise extends into private property, where you set the rules of your own property, and also is the only place where you have an expectation of privacy.by thewebguyd
- Imagine all licence plates being small screens and periodically showing numbers derived from a private key issued by the DMV. As they change, vehicles could not be tracked without knowing the private key, yet the DMV can verify the ownership because they know one. I am not a crypto expert, and the actual scheme may be a bit more sophisticated, but you’ve got the idea.by vzaliva
- That would be more expensive, as it requires electronics and infrastructure, the screens would be hacked and vandalized constantly, short out in bad weather, etc. It would be more robust just using some kind of transponder, but that might fall afoul of FCC rules, IDK.
Also the cops would just get the private keys from the DMV anyway. It's all the same government.
by krapp - https://www.nytimes.com/2026/08/10/us/flock-cameras-can-trac...
“In recent years, as artificial intelligence has advanced, Flock has added the ability to search for cars based on their make, type, color, or unique details, such as bumper stickers or visible damage.” So TOTP license plates is not enough.
by ryeights - A warrant is better than no warrant, but:
A warrant requirement is not a reasonable bandaid to consider allowing mass spying. There should be no mass spying by default.
A warrant requirement makes sense for something like the locations of customers on cellular networks, because, although it should be improved, it's been built into the tech.
When you make the optional choice to create mass spying, safeguards do not make it acceptable.
by Cider9986 - This should be up to the citizens. If you're living in Oakland with rampant theft and illegal dumping, it's a reasonable trade-off to allow tracking down perpetrators with a warrant. Most people would not agree to allowing police to do arbitrary searches of that data without a warrant.
- Either it needs a warrant or it’s fully open and people can start creating websites showing the movements of local politicians.
This middle ground that municipalities try to carve out where it’s fully open to police without a warrant but not subject to FOIL laws doesn’t appear tenable for much longer.
There’s been too many cases of police officers stalking exes, poking around the data for fun and such so it’s clear police cannot be trusted with the data without better court oversight.
It’s certainly a very powerful investigative tool, but needs solid 4th amendment protections. The Supreme Court’s recent ruling on geofence searches of cell phone records is a good indication on where the Supreme Court’s head is at on this sort of thing, where they said no you can’t just do blanket data dumps like that without a warrant.
by cmiles8 - There's nothing stopping you from buying an LPR and publishing the data. Also, with a PI license, you (might) be able to access the nationwide Nlets LPR Index.
https://nlets.org/resources/blog/nlets-news-our-nationwide-l...
- IMO it shouldn't need a warrant, but it should require the searcher to fill out a form explaining which crime they are investigating with this search. It can then immediately show them results without approval, but with serious consequences for misuse.
They could even run some AI over the request forms to spot unusual activity like an officer constantly requesting the location of their ex wife.
by SchemaLoad