DEA installs license-plate recognition devices near Southwest border

[jct74]

DEA installs license-plate recognition devices near Southwest border
Other states have objected to use of the devices, citing lack of transparency.

by G.W. Schulz, Center for Investigative Reporting - July 11 2012, 7:50pm EDT


In their unending battle to deter illegal immigration, drug trafficking and terrorism, U.S. authorities already have beefed up border security with drug-sniffing dogs, aircraft, and thousands more agents manning interior checkpoints.

Now, the US Drug Enforcement Administration has decided it wants more, and the Justice Department agency doesn’t care whether someone has even set foot in Mexico.

Clusters of what at first appear to be surveillance cameras have begun turning up in recent months on the Southwest border, and while some of the machines are merely surveillance cameras, others are specialized recognition devices that automatically capture license-plate numbers and the geographic location of everyone who passes by, plus the date and time.

The DEA confirms that the devices have been deployed in Arizona, California, Texas, and New Mexico. It has plans to introduce them farther inside the United States.

Special Agent Ramona Sanchez, a spokeswoman for the DEA’s Phoenix division, said the information collected by the devices is stored for up to two years and can be shared with other federal agencies and local police. She declined to say how many have been installed or where, citing safety concerns.

read more:
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/07/dea-installs-license-plate-recognition-devices-near-southwest-border/

[FindLiberty]

Robocop. Skynet. Doom...

[kcchiefs6465]

We've already had a few in the previous county I lived in.

Both the Charlottesville and Albemarle County police departments have quietly started using a controversial new technology that allows specially equipped patrol cars to read and record every license plate they pass.

City officers have been using the equipment since summer, said Lt. Ronnie Roberts. The county program rolled out earlier this month, scoring its first hit last week, said Cpl. Sean Hackney.

State police have had six or eight of the devices for a couple of years, and rotate them through the state in an effort to combat automobile theft, said spokeswoman Corinne Geller.

John W. Whitehead, founder of the Rutherford Institute, a locally based civil liberties group, said the decision should have been public.

“This needs to be something that’s put forward so people can discuss it,” he said. “Things are not supposed to be done in secret.”
As it’s set up right now, the equipment runs each plate it reads against a list of vehicles police want to find. Those are often cars reported stolen, cars listed in Amber alerts and similar vehicles. When police start looking for a suspect’s vehicle, they can also search back through the saved plates in an effort to divine where the suspect is likely to go.

“It helps us in stolen cars, unauthorized use, stuff like that,” Roberts said.

The county saves a record of plates for 60 days; the city saves them for 90.

Each department has one camera, obtained with grant funding. The county machine cost $7,000, Hackney said.

When the camera registers a hit, Hackney said, officers then must confirm that the machine has read the plate correctly and call the plate in again to confirm that the information that someone is looking for it is still correct.

The response by officers to the Charlottesville camera has been very positive, Roberts said.

Whitehead said the technology invades privacy and reverses a traditional relationship between passersby and police.

“You’re presumed guilty now by technology,” he said.

Whitehead expects police to add the devices to more and more patrol cars, chipping away at drivers’ privacy, he said.

As county police searched for suspects in a string of break-ins that plagued Albemarle and other nearby jurisdictions for months, they drove the system around the Richmond Road area.

The vehicle they ended up stopping in connection with those crimes was displaying tags that had been reported stolen from Charlottesville, according to court documents, but police were tipped off not by the new camera but by a residential alarm.

Hackney emphasized that officers still have to manually verify all of the machine’s findings and said the technology cuts needless detainments while officers run tags that come back clean. So far the county has trained eight officers to use the machine, Hackney said.

Charlottesville police officials are in the process of reviewing policies being written nationally about the machines and determining which to adopt here.

Hackney said the system can’t yet search for expired inspections or registrations or suspended drivers, but if the state Department of Motor Vehicles developed a suitable database, those functions could be added.

The county is also exploring setting up an exchange system for data with other nearby agencies, Hackney said.

http://www2.dailyprogress.com/news/2010/nov/28/local-police-cars-can-read-license-plates-ar-681438/

They really are everywhere. You can tell the cop cars that have them by the a camera on the hood of the car and on the trunk of the car. The one reported on in the county I was in, not the county referred to in the article, but pretty damn close, were reported to be able to see 10 miles, in any condition. (If my memory suits me right, as it has been 2-3 years since this was reported in local newspapers) Scary shit.

[kcchiefs6465]

Robocop. Skynet. Doom...
SOFEX 2012 hosted Skynet. As well as iRobot. SOFEX is the meeting (Special Operation Forces Exosition) of around 85-100 countries to trade the most advanced weapon systems to-date with one another. Guess who represents the most floor space? (A rhetorical question) Seriously, generals from around the world obtain weapon systems to kill, perhaps the generals within twenty feet of them, from supposedly nuetral countries. In all actuality the weapons are often times (or rather the majority of times) used to oppress the people of their respective countries. Never forget though, they hate us for our freedom.