Automatic License Plate Readers Are Making Getaway Cars Extinct (qz.com) 147
An anonymous reader shares a report: On Tuesday, Sept. 10, the Total Choice Credit Union in Laplace, Louisiana was robbed. At approximately 3:06 pm, a man in his early thirties walked in wearing jeans, a white shirt, sunglasses, and a brown dreadlock wig, according to a now-unsealed complaint filed last month in US federal court. He passed a handwritten note to one of the tellers which read: "ROBBERY. I DON'T WANT TO (HURT) OR (KILL) YOU OR ANYONE IN HERE SO I AM GOING TO GIVE YOU (FIVE SECONDS) TO (EMPTY) YOUR (REGISTER)." The teller handed over more than $7,000 to the thief, who fled on foot. Investigators canvassed the area for nearby surveillance cameras that might have picked up any clues. They found one with footage of an "older model white single-cab pickup truck stopped in the area directly behind the bank," a minute or two before the robbery went down. That's when cops turned to a tool that has rendered the concept of a getaway car all but obsolete -- the national network of automated license plate readers. These are fixed cameras with sensors that can be found in on utility poles, streetlights, overpasses, in police cars, even within traffic cones and digital speed display signs that show drivers how fast they're going.
The technology, known as ALPR, can clock roughly 2,000 plates a minute, on vehicles traveling up to 120 mph. Each license plate is photographed and the date, time, and location are recorded. Law enforcement can access a target's movements in real time, or mine the data later to track a suspect's daily patterns. ALPR systems cast an incredibly wide net that has made it far easier for cops to catch criminals. The method has also drawn harsh criticism from the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and privacy advocates as "a technology deployed with too few rules," and "a form of mass surveillance." There are few accurate estimates of the exact number of ALPRs across the US, which is a hodgepodge of local, state, and federal and tribal license plate readers.
The technology, known as ALPR, can clock roughly 2,000 plates a minute, on vehicles traveling up to 120 mph. Each license plate is photographed and the date, time, and location are recorded. Law enforcement can access a target's movements in real time, or mine the data later to track a suspect's daily patterns. ALPR systems cast an incredibly wide net that has made it far easier for cops to catch criminals. The method has also drawn harsh criticism from the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and privacy advocates as "a technology deployed with too few rules," and "a form of mass surveillance." There are few accurate estimates of the exact number of ALPRs across the US, which is a hodgepodge of local, state, and federal and tribal license plate readers.
Making getaway cars extinct? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Making getaway cars extinct? (Score:4, Insightful)
No, the entire infrastructure needs to get stuffed.
I was on the way home from the movies, and got pulled over. I had transferred a plate from one car to the one I was driving a week before at the local motor vehicles branch.
The guy came towards my window, 9mm out, and asked me to step out of the car. After a conversation showing the paperwork, he re-holstered his manhood and swore loudly walking back to his patrol car. Twenty minutes later, after verifying everything, he "let me go". Yes, he has an ALPR on his dash that sourced a database that hadn't been updated.
Fuck that shit.
Re: Making getaway cars extinct? (Score:5, Insightful)
"guy came towards my window, 9mm out"
And cops wonder why decent upstanding citizens no longer respect the police. Because they act like gangster thugs, that's why.
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I understand weapon identification. Because you believe that rapid weapon identification is related to being "gangsta thugs" you've both slimed and prejudged me. Fuck you, too, bro.
Your hypocratic BS and privilege are showing.
Re: Making getaway cars extinct? (Score:2)
How does saying the cop acted like a gangster thug slime you?? You're the one at whom he needlessly brandished his weapon. In fact I implied you are a decent upstanding citizen.
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He's a little too anxious to point out everyone's "privilege", apparently.
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"guy came towards my window, 9mm out"
And cops wonder why decent upstanding citizens no longer respect the police. Because they act like gangster thugs, that's why.
Would you? I mean America, the nation which worships Jesus and the 9mm, would you approach a suspected stolen vehicle with a suspected criminal inside who more than likely owns a gun unarmed?
The problem is not the police being thugs, it's that your entire society has made people act like thugs to each other.
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And cops wonder why decent upstanding citizens no longer respect the police. Because they act like gangster thugs, that's why.
Cops do it because plenty of "gangster thugs" have drawn and shot at cops on routine traffic stops.
And remember, it's not like he made an illegal turn on red or failed to signal and he had weapon drawn on him for that. He was flagged as driving a stolen car, a crime with a higher likelihood for violence.
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"that is the approach required by law"
At best, its department policy, not law. I'd be shocked that there is a LAW on the books that says an officer approaching a "suspected" stolen vehicle is REQUIRED to approach said vehicle with a weapon drawn.
There are very few laws that dictate how the police use force in an aggressive way.
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Yep because a database update wasn't done the entire system needs to be thrown out. In other news we should turn the internet off because of trolling.
Re:Making getaway cars extinct? (Score:5, Informative)
Yeah, the systems do report the make/model/color against the tag number. Stolen cars don't typically go around with the stolen plates.
Re:Making getaway cars extinct? (Score:4, Interesting)
There was a news story the other day that wound up involving a stolen car where someone had stolen the license plate of a same vintage, same model, same color car.
I guess the idea is that unless a cop checks VIN numbers you could be driving a stolen car and not have it identified.
The weak spot in all this is somebody reporting the license plate stolen. I suppose you work around that stealing plates at the airport or somewhere else you suspect the cars aren't moving for a few days.
You could probably also steal just front license plates. Around here we have plates front and rear and odds are somebody wouldn't know their front plate was missing for a while.
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This has been Standard Theiving Procedure for over a decade, to the extent that even the cop shows don't explain the point any more. If you want a car for tomorrow's robbery, you record the number plate of a car on a second hand salesman's forecourt along with the make and colour (make it an easy-to-steal model), then spend the evening driving around looking for a matching car parked up on a busy street ; s
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It doesn't require any action from the operator. The system simply scans the plates and records the location. If it sees a plate that is on a stolen/BOLO list then it sends an alert to the operator. That's the 'A' in APNR: automated.
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It doesn't require any action from the operator. The system simply scans the plates and records the location. If it sees a plate that is on a stolen/BOLO list then it sends an alert to the operator. That's the 'A' in APNR: automated.
The discussion at hand is around when the make and model of the car the plate is on doesn't match what the database says it should be. Unless they managed to automate that part of it, which it doesn't appear they have yet, it would require the operator to be paying attention to the monitor and comparing that to the vehicle that the plate is on.
The hardest part of the system you describe is getting an accurate OCR off the plate, the rest is CS-101 development class project level.
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Go ahead. Call me a liar. Didn't happen to you, so it's out of your concept of reality. Appreciate your concern.
It was the wrong plate on the wrong car, or so he believed and told me as much. Yeah, it happened. Some DBA didn't do his/her job. I get pulled over. Happened. Live with the facts, not your idealisms. Haven't had a so much as a parking ticket in decades. City cop. Cowboy looking for a GTA or something. Wasn't me. I had the proof. Glad he put the nine down towards the ground. Could've been much wor
Re:Making getaway cars extinct? (Score:4, Interesting)
My apologies, I shouldn't have been crass about it. That'll probably cost me some karma.
That being said, the info I could find doesn't indicate that these systems are automating make/model/color identification. That means that the cop would have to manually compare the results of the system to what they are seeing, and I can't imagine the workload of trying to do that while driving in traffic. Bored cop, minimal traffic, can certainly see it.
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So far as I know, he follows me for two city blocks, flashes his lights. Total time following before lights, maybe a minute in heavy traffic as the movie lets out and the block fills up. Boom, gumballs. I find a non-blocking spot to pull over. He hesitates maybe ten seconds, then out he comes, partner inside.
I didn't think to ask, hey officer? Um, what kind of software do you use? This community spends a lot of $$ on automation. CLEARLY the state doesn't send enough $$ on database administrator overtime. Re
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The presumption of violence is the problem in this country. Heaven help you if you're not part of the white aristocracy. This is like Jo'burg in the '70s.
Caveman says: Ugh. Car might be stolen. Better draw my club. Beat other caveman with my stick (conversely, pump him full of lead).
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Guns aren't the problem.
People are the problem.
Re: Making getaway cars extinct? (Score:2)
I think the problem there is that is that there are too many guns in your country.
With all due respect, you feel there are too many guns in our country.
Let's at least agree that they're not the same thing.
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I think the problem there is that is that there are too many guns in your country.
With all due respect, you feel there are too many guns in our country.
With all due respect, you only feel that you have a point. He stated it clearly as opinion when he said "I think". You are just throwing the "feeling" in there to suggest that his opinion is based on emotion. It's a flimsy attempt to discredit him. If you disagree with his claim, make a substantive argument to refute it.
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One more citizen who believes that there are sufficient holes in the process that people will get killed and mistakenly. Was I lucky?
Very lucky. Your skin tone was light enough you weren't shot out of hand.
There shouldn't be such a thing as luck when it comes to asserting power and rendering dignity.
That is certainly true. But the fundamental morality of the country would have to change. That cop came at you with his gun out because, to him, the rights of the property owner (of the car) exceed the human rights of the driver (you, the 'thief'). That's where that ridiculous overreaction comes from. And it's a perfectly reasonable belief in a culture that worships the almighty dollar. And it's also why that won't change any tim
Looking for a specific car. (Score:2)
That means that the cop would have to manually compare the results of the system to what they are seeing
Might be going the other way around: the cop might be actively looking for a car that happens to match a given model.
e.g.:
Cop received a call from mothership about some suspect's car (say a suspect being seen fleeing a crime scene in a given car model).
postbigbang happens to drive a car which fits the description.
City cop happens to drive around at that exact time. Notice postbigbang's car.
"hum... that car fits the description I heard on the radio. let's run a check to be sure..."
Automated plate reader fetc
Re: Making getaway cars extinct? (Score:2)
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Real time make/model comparison isn't impossible, but way harder.
Not really. It happens all the time. Just spend a few minutes listening to police radio and catch them running plates. In my area, make/model is part of a regular response to running a plate verbally over the air. Running checks verbally happens more often then one might realize in a discussion about ALPR.
Additionally, a quick search shows 4 states (California being one) where the plates stay with the vehicle rather than the owner. In this situation, returning make/model becomes less "way harder" and far m
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Re: Making getaway cars extinct? (Score:2)
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What's the problem?
Tracking and recovering stolen cars yet another benefit; check the cameras where the victim reports the thing stolen and you might even find your perp
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Don't people just take an Uber to get away these days?
Re:Making getaway cars extinct? (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't people just take an Uber to get away these days?
If you really want to rob a bank, get a job there and do it from the inside.
Even better, pick a softer target.
If your crime requires you to point a gun at people, you are going to do hard time. Do you really want to risk 20 years in prison for $7000?
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If your crime requires you to point a gun at people, you are going to do hard time. Do you really want to risk 20 years in prison for $7000?
The article didn't say anything about him carrying a gun-- he just handed the teller a note.
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If your crime requires you to point a gun at people, you are going to do hard time. Do you really want to risk 20 years in prison for $7000?
The article didn't say anything about him carrying a gun-- he just handed the teller a note.
I personally know a guy* who put his finger in a small brown paper bag and tried to rob a Safeway (food store) in Tucson. He was drunk, and they didn't feel threatened. The store employees chased him on foot until he fell.
He ended up getting (what amounts to) 11 calendar years, which is lenient for armed robbery in Arizona, USA.
It doesn't matter if you really have a gun or not. It's armed robbery.
*He, actually, is a smart guy, and he would never hurt anybody. He was depressed and didn't care what happened t
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Do the math (Score:2, Informative)
Rob a bank, get prison time.
Own a bank, rob the people, get... a bailout?
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Exactly, a getaway car typically has many license plates to switch from in its trunk to defeat that. The article is silly. I don't remember where, but I have even seen a concept, implemented or not, where the plate holder was a rotary 3D triangle which would allow you to switch from 3 plates number while driving.
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Re:Making getaway cars extinct? (Score:4, Funny)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
tl;dr (Score:5, Insightful)
Relax, citizen. Sacrificing privacy is for your own good. We promise.
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relax citizen, there is no need to show us your papers
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relax citizen, there is no need to show us your papers
... because we're just going to shoot your ass and then go laugh about it over beers.
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... because we're just going to shoot your ass and then go laugh about it over beers.
That's why there's bodycams and dash cameras. There is absolutely nothing wrong with those.
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Yeah well no one has really shown the negative impacts of such a system. It's why it's hard to sell the idea of privacy, all the complaints sound like anti-government conspiracies.
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Yeah well no one has really shown the negative impacts of such a system. It's why it's hard to sell the idea of privacy, all the complaints sound like anti-government conspiracies.
Then even when there are actual precedents of parallel construction thanks to mass surveillance, the beat goes on.
Failure to learn from history seems to be a great challenge even in the 'information age'.
APLRs are making privacy extinct (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, you can catch a few more criminals by total surveillance. But in return you violate everyone else's privacy.
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Re: APLRs are making privacy extinct (Score:2)
But in return you violate everyone else's privacy.
And the cows go on believing that's a bug, not a feature.
The ranchers know better.
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If you are in public then you can expect to be seen.
There is no expectation that someone should be able to go out in public and not be recognized.
Putting a car around yourself shouldn't change that. Heck, from every cop show, we know that one of the first questions asked at a crime scene will be "Did you get the license plate number?"
This
Stolen cars (Score:4, Insightful)
So does this mean the cops will actually help me find my stolen car, considering they know exactly where it is/was/went?
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/bugs bunny picture: "No".
Re: Stolen cars (Score:3)
Of course not. There is a strict policy that all this new totalitarian technology is ONLY to be used against decent citizens, never to help them.
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So does this mean the cops will actually help me find my stolen car, considering they know exactly where it is/was/went?
It didn't actually help catch my stolen car, even when I got notices in the mail that my stolen car drove back and forth across the bridges in the area, each time dinging my Fastrak account because the license plate readers identified it.
Face and plate (Score:2)
Who is that going to be a problem for?
Criminals and illegal migrants.
Your ID to drive, license plate and face is going to have to be accepted to drive legally.
Re: Face and plate (Score:2)
"Who is that going to be a problem for?"
Dissidents. Anyone who has even slightly annoyed the totalitarian state. Vast multitudes persecuted under badlaws.
Probable cause to pull you over. (Score:2)
Re: Probable cause to pull you over. (Score:3)
I'm sure it already is, and has been for a while.
Let's make a public ALPR network. (Score:3)
Let's make a network of privately owned ALPR cameras set up in people's houses and businesses and even cars. In no time at all we could be monitoring where our politicians and public officials are going. Because information wants to be free. How long do you think it would take for these to be banned ... for everyone except the government.
Inevitably the cost of the hardware needed to do this is going to come steeply down. The camera part is already dirt cheap but I suspect enough computer vision capability is still pricey. As for software, a quick search found that OpenALPR already exists. Just publish all the data you find on a web page with something like "ALPR" in the page title and let Google index it for everyone.
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The camera part is already dirt cheap but I suspect enough computer vision capability is still pricey.
Is $99 [seeedstudio.com] cheap enough for you? That's probably overkill. You could actually train the neural net on that board, not just run it. According to comparative benchmarks [github.com] it can run some image recognition neural nets at better than 25 fps.
And if you're a private investigator..... (Score:2)
You just have to know which company to ask.
Vanity license plates (Score:2)
They've released smoked license plate covers. They've released spraypaint that causes glare to confuse speed cameras. Next step is an e-ink license plate that can change its ID at will.
Criminals will always adapt. It's the legal citizens that need to worry about this level of surveillance technology.
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https://www.reviewgeek.com/422... [reviewgeek.com]
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Leela: "Didn't you have ads in the 20th century?"
Fry: "Well sure, but not on our cars' license plates! Only on TV and radio...and in magazines...and movies. And at ball games, on buses, and milk carto
Here in Sweden... (Score:2)
We don't have much in the way of surveillance, but thieves are still smart enough to steal license plates from a similar model of car, and then use it one off, and exchange it for another fake plate shortly after the crime - why don't they do this in the US? I learned this, as I have had a few of my plates nicked and used for various activities...
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The amount of realtime detail any city/state police can collect is kind of tricky.
Drive into a city and the city collects on the face, plate (back/front), passengers face, any smartphone thats on..
Federally a well placed camera set can match the face to the plate to a smartphone that powered on.
The trick been nobody wants to talk about that much and mention that "side" of an investigation in an open court..
Better to follow the person and wait for a "crime" protecti
Only for the stupid (Score:2)
Who use their own cars to commit crimes.
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Who use their own cars to commit crimes.
The point is not that they can link the car to the database at the DMV and later go knock on the door of the owner. The point is that they can track the car to see where it goes. The network is big enough that the license plate will keep getting flagged as it gets spotted along its route. Doesn't matter if the plate is stolen or if the robber is using their own car; they're using it to track where the car goes.
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Hawkins First Law: criminals are stupid. If they had what we fancy "average intelligence", we'd be3 in big trouble . . .
hawk
And now... (Score:2)
Why? (Score:2)
The technology, known as ALPR, can clock roughly 2,000 plates a minute, on vehicles traveling up to 120 mph.
So getaway drivers need to drive faster than 120mph, which i would imagine is not uncommon when someone is trying to flee from the police.
On the other hand, if you're going to commit a robbery why wouldn't you also use a stolen car and/or stolen plates? The cameras can track the vehicles, but they can't track the fact you've ditched one car and moved to another one, nor can they track the fact you've changed the plates... If the police are relying on the trace of a particular license plate, it's quite easy
I've seen the movies (Score:3)
Bank Robbers drive the getaway car a short distance to a quite area and switch to a clean car or change the false plates.
Seriously is this sort of Bank Robbery still a thing in the US? Armed bank robbery has largely disappeared in the UK. There are easier ways that get lower sentences like using stolen teleporters or diggers to snatch ATM machines from remote locations.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-... [bbc.co.uk]
Not just your plates (Score:2)
Unfortunately anything that can transmit from your car can be captured and logged.
Changing plates is just a visual thing.
Your phone. Leave at home.
Your fitness watch etc check.
Change tags check.
Cut wires to entertainment system check.
Cut wires to onstar check.
You forget https://www.schneier.com/blog/... [schneier.com] to kill TPMS in each wheel?
Opps
Link to aritcle for anyone interested in reading i (Score:2)
Here's the link to the referenced article since it wasn't included in the summary:
https://qz.com/1722215/technology-is-making-getaway-cars-extinct/
Soon to be Monitized (Score:2)
More fun with cameras (Score:2)
I actually have an ALPR system (Score:4, Informative)
Full disclosure: I installed an ALPR system at my house more than a year ago, after someone did a hit-and-run on my parked car to the tune of $4500 before driving off. About 9,000 cars a week pass by my house, and I run the professional version of OpenALPR on a Dell box with Ubuntu installed, and with the OpenALPR agent running on an Nvidia graphics card. My LPR cameras are Dahua 12X zoom varifocal cameras with exposure settings optimized for license plate capture.
Since installing my system, I've provided plate numbers and photographs for several vehicles involved in hit-and-runs on my neighbors' vehicles, which they were extremely grateful to receive. I've also assisted the police in the recovery of two stolen cars that were being used by serial burglars hitting cars and houses in my neighborhood, along with the arrest of one of those burglars. It's been a very useful system.
So a few observations based on my experience with OpenALPR:
(1) The license plate recognition is quite good, but not perfect. I would estimate >95% accuracy, as dirt, bike racks, trailers, etc. may block part of a plate. But I never rely on the system itself for identification. If necessary, I pull the video footage and verify the plate number by eye, stepping through it frame by frame.
(2) OpenALPR alerts are extremely fast. If a car in my alert list were to pass by my house, I'd get a text message within a few seconds.
(3) Vehicle identification is iffy at best. Under good daytime lighting conditions, it is perhaps 70% to 80% accurate. In the dark, it is useless, as exposure settings must be optimized for plate capture, and the car is invisible except for headlights / taillights. Vehicle ID can also be confused if there are two or more vehicles in the image. As for vehicle color, unless it is daylight, you can't rely on OpenALPR to get it right.
(4) The issues with vehicle identification and color could be alleviated (somewhat) with an additional camera with different exposure settings, but the problem of false positives remains. Having said that, I know from my interactions with the police that they always confirm plate number / vehicle make / model / color before pulling over a vehicle. That is standard procedure, regardless of whatever information I have provided them.
In reading the comments on this thread, I see lots of "Oh, a smart criminal could do x, y, or z, so LPR is useless." By that logic, we should abandon locks, safes, and alarms, since they don't stop smart burglars. Sure, a true professional criminal can (with enough time and resources) outwit any system. But most criminals are rank amateurs (drunk drivers, gang members, bored teenagers, drug addicts, etc.). They aren't going to be driving a stolen car with a rolling license plate like in some James Bond movie. They aren't even going to bother swapping plates with another car. They just don't think that way.
In my city, most auto thefts are crimes of opportunity by petty criminals. We have a lot of problems with teenage gang members stealing cars, then driving them around for a week or two to commit crimes before abandoning the vehicles to steal another. I have advocated for the installation of more ALPR cameras do identify and track stolen cars so that they could be recovered within a matter of hours rather than days. Find the car, and usually you also find stolen guns and drugs with the occupants, plus you stop them from committing more crimes (at least until the juvenile justice system lets them walk again).
Most petty criminals don't bother swapping plates. They are looking to get some quick cash, or score more drugs, or steal something to buy drugs. Just last month, the ALPR system in a city north of me caught several people driving stolen cars, with tags intact. So an ALPR system does work, as I can confirm from personal experience. It's not perfect, but a network of ALPR cameras would have a significant impact on the recovery of stolen cars if implemented in my city. Plus there's the issue of drunk drivers and hit-and-run drivers who could be located, rather than leaving their victims to pay for their crimes.
Re: My bicycle doesn't have a license plate (Score:2, Funny)
Re: My bicycle doesn't have a license plate (Score:2)
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Warrant for what? A camera? You guys are weird. Drama queens.
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True. Next thing, some crazy person will expect a warrant to gather skin cells. Or sound waves.
Re: ...but...but... they got a warrant right? (Score:2)
Silly patriot, don't you know the Constitution was repealed in 2001?
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visible to plain sight in a public location. The only new factor is the capability to read and record a lot of them quickly... but that difference in quantity really makes a qualitative difference that the law hasn't caught up with.
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But they got a warrant right? Oh wait no... the license plate readers are owned by the government. HOW CONVEEENIENT!
You don't need a warrant to track someone in public.
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I don't get it. License plates aren't private information. Never have been.
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No, but detailing your movements and where you have been/visited seems like private information. Having someone follow you around all day taking notes seems like private information even if they only followed you around in public space only or taken pictures through the window.
I don't think it's so much that you see a license plate on the street as it is that you string it all together to deduce things you couldn't have from just a single encounter.
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No it isn't a crime. You can hire people to do exactly that.
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No it isn't a crime. You can hire people to do exactly that.
Of course. It's been legal on an individual level.
This hasn't been addressed by the law before because it hasn't been possible before -- tracking all cars? Everywhere? All the time? Sure, you could hire some people to track a person. But look through records of where any person has been at any time? That feels like a different issue.
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It might seem like private information to you, but it isn't. I know. Amazing.
Re: Nice usage (Score:2)
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Of course you can. Any time. There are any number of methods available, and some of them are even painless.
Although, a far, far better question would be, "Are we ready to start fighting back yet?"
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There's no need, really. The average person has willingly and voluntarily chosen to carry a very trackable device on their person at all times. The few people who aren't carrying a phone can just automatically be assumed to be up to no good by expressing anti-social sentiments towards communication with others.
Just read up on how Bluetooth beacons are being used to track people and target advertising in retail stores. I was, and continue to be, a person who strongly recognizes the value of personal privacy
Re: We should never have gotten license plates at (Score:2)
How much does Emperor Xi pay you? Is your troll farm hiring? Asking for a friend...
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If we can really flood a town with cams we can stop almost all crimes
No. You will deter a small number of crimes but you will primarily have greater information available to assist in solving crime. Crime will still continue.
Honesty is about to be compelled. It should be very interesting.
No, it's not, and the mere prospect should horrify you.
I've broken the law 7 times already today. The court system just can't keep up, and the economy would collapse because everybody would be waiting to see a judge instead of going to work.
the Coward in Chief named Trump.
Ah. I see, I'm trying to converse with an idiot. Fuck off.