
“No Cost” License Plate Readers Are Turning Texas Police into Debt Collectors - DiabloD3
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2016/01/no-cost-license-plate-readers-are-turning-texas-police-mobile-debt-collectors-and
======
jimrandomh
> As police cars patrol the city, they ping on license plates associated with
> the fees. The officer then pulls the driver over and offers them a devil’s
> bargain: go to jail, or pay the original fine with an extra 25% processing
> fee tacked on, all of which goes to Vigilant.

So, they're planning to turn the Texas prison system into de facto debtors'
prisons, and the Texas police system into de facto highwaymen. One more factor
to add to the giant pile of reasons for ill-will that the US state and Federal
governments have been collecting. That pile can't get much taller without
toppling, and while I do greatly hope the blowback happens through the
democratic process, that process is pretty severely damaged and this looks
less and less likely every year.

~~~
sithadmin
> they're planning to turn the Texas prison system into de facto debtors'
> prisons

Whoa there, hold on a second. That's not what's going on at all. The plates
are being run to detect if the car's owner has _outstanding court fines_ ,
which are not akin to a simple debt. These are (probably) justified, punitive
fees imposed on an individual for some kind of offense against the law (and by
extension, the public). It's not the case that the police are extorting people
that are behind on their rent/credit card payments or something.

That said, this behavior is still troubling insofar as it is likely to
disproportionately result in the targeting and punishment of the poor, which
is in itself a rather problematic issue. And it's certainly troubling that the
additional fee being imposed to process payment for the fines collected is far
above what seems to be (at a glance, anyway) a reasonable margin for operating
costs.

~~~
arca_vorago
First, I don't think you can make the distinction between whatever you are
calling "simple debt" (care to at least define things that you make up?) and
the various fees associated with the United States and particularly the Texas
legal system.

Second, even if you grant there is a difference between the debt types, how
can he be wrong about it being de facto "debtors prison"? Who cares what the
debt type is, it would still be a debtors prison, and there are a myriad of
very good reasons we got rid of such things!

Third, the legal system is extremely unfavourable to the middle-class and
poor, to the extent that I would also argue with your claim that the fees are
"(probably) justified"... Another thing to remember is that fees have become
revenue generators, and to look at them as punitive damages to be payed to the
public for offenses is a naive take on the ways fees have developed in the
legal and justice systems.

For example, I (in Texas btw) who almost never gets tickets, got one last
year. Normally I have a paralegal friend do the deferred adjudication, I take
a class, and move on. Well this last ticket they missed the deadline, I forgot
about it, and the original $160 fee ballooned eventually to $700! Not only
that, but technically, until I payed it, there was a warrant out for my
arrest!

Do you think that kind of percentage increase is warranted or the warrant for
arrest for not paying a fee is justified, because I certainly don't. I managed
to pay it off, but for someone earning less would have had a very hard time
paying that big of a fee, much less the financial impact of being fucking
arrested...

" It's not the case that the police are extorting people that are behind on
their rent/credit card payments or something."

Please explain how this is correct now, because it seems obviously false.
(aka, they _are_ extorting people because they are behind on payments (just
because you made the false distinction of credit cards/rent and court fines
does not make that fact magically go away...), and the police are even doing
it for a third party!)

That's not even getting into the privacy and other issues the eff raises. For
example, my paralegal friend has access to the TLO system and can look up
plates and their geo/time data. While she wouldn't abuse it, the barriers to
entry for paralegals can be pretty low in some firms...

~~~
jrs235
"Third, the legal system is extremely unfavourable to the middle-class and
poor, to the extent that I would also argue with your claim that the fees are
"(probably) justified"... Another thing to remember is that fees have become
revenue generators, and to look at them as punitive damages to be payed to the
public for offenses is a naive take on the ways fees have developed in the
legal and justice systems." I couldn't agree more.

The penalty for civil infractions is a fine and/or jail time. We've become so
use to just payig fines we think it's a debtors prison if the law breaker
doesn't pay the fine so we opt to penalize then with jail time. Perhaps we
should just great everyone fairly and use jail time penalties only. That could
lead to some reforms read quickly. The bigger offense and issue I have is when
the state then charges the inmates for room and board. That's wrong.

------
hardwaresofton
I can't say I'm surprised that this is happening. As technology progresses, it
only makes sense that government becomes more efficient at doing things that
we like and don't like. As soon as red-light cameras became OK, or any license
plate reading systems, this eventuality was on the table.

I'm only saddened by the fact that they've been essentially duped by some
private sector company into selling private citizens' data (and allowing them
to retain it even after expiration of the contract) instead of trying to
develop this technology themselves, and actually innovating. This move reduces
citizen privacy, and costs citizens privacy all at the same time.

The next thing I look to see happen is automated speeding tickets. There's no
reason radars shouldn't be set up in conjuction with license plate readers, or
actually just pulling speed data from cars with in-car transmission ability
and tickets being auto-generated to constituents.

Imagine trying to argue against why your car shouldn't be monitored for
speeding infringements -- surely you're either a speeder trying to kill kids
and families, or you're a getaway driver trying to commit crimes. Then the law
goes into place (of course, save the kids), then people realize some car
companies transmit location info by accident/on purpose, and people can now
pretty much watch you drive places.

~~~
JadeNB
> The next thing I look to see happen is automated speeding tickets. There's
> no reason radars shouldn't be set up in conjuction with license plate
> readers, or actually just pulling speed data from cars with in-car
> transmission ability and tickets being auto-generated to constituents.

This seems like a Catch-22, though. Any state that actually enforced speeding
laws systematically would wind up ticketing (almost) all drivers, (almost) all
the time, and the selective nature of current enforcement of speeding limits
would become so glaringly apparent that (one hopes) the problems with it
couldn't be ignored.

Especially in a state like Texas, where "no regulation" is a religious mantra,
it's hard to imagine that the result would be anything but raising the speed
limits on the road to reflect actual driving conditions—which, I'd argue, is a
good thing. (I don't know anything about the reason, but I do know that, on a
stretch of I-35 that I have driven regularly for a few years, the speed limit
has increased; and the trend statewide seems to be towards higher limits, with
much of I-10 having a speed limit of 80 mph—beyond which I, as a Prius driver,
wouldn't go significantly even if I were legally allowed to do so.)

~~~
vhold
I've heard the argument before, not sure if it was backed with any real data,
that perfect enforcement leads to wiping out tickets as a source of revenue,
because people start actually obeying the law.

In some cases it actually makes things more dangerous, like red-light cameras
appear to cause accidents, because people afraid of tickets start slamming on
their brakes when the light turns yellow, and get rear ended.

[http://abcnews.go.com/US/red-light-camera-backlash-
cameras-c...](http://abcnews.go.com/US/red-light-camera-backlash-cameras-
causing-accidents/story?id=13925887)

~~~
bsder
> perfect enforcement leads to wiping out tickets as a source of revenue,
> because people start actually obeying the law.

Exactly.

And this is why most red-light cameras got dismantled. They were about
revenue. Once everybody knew that the cameras were there, revenue went to
zero.

I have _NO_ problem with red-light cameras at actually dangerous
intersections. The goal is to get people to obey the law, after all.

------
carc
"We’re unlikely to get answers from the government agencies who signed these
contracts. To access Vigilant’s powerful online data systems, agencies agree
not to disparage the company or even to talk to the press without the
company’s permission"

How is it possibly legal for a government, which is supposed to be
transparent, to contract with a private company and accept a term saying they
cannot talk about the private company without company approval?

------
s0uthPaw88
To me the most disturbing part is that Vigilant can keep the data for as long
as they want:

> According the company's usage and privacy policy, Vigilant “retains LPR data
> as long as it has commercial value.” Vigilant can sell or license that
> information to other law enforcement bodies, and potentially private
> companies such as insurance firms and repossession agencies.

------
DanielBMarkham
Just when you think it can't get worse. It gets worse.

I guess in a crazy kind of way it makes sense. Government has been mooching
off commercial data collection for some time. It's about time the commercial
sector got to use government agents as sort of a contracted private
intelligence agency.

<sarcastically>And hell, you could bump this up a notch. Just start paying for
body cams on all federal agents. If the agent needs the data in court you save
it, otherwise it can magically disappear (without any kind of judicial
overview). Better yet, lying to a federal agent is a felony! So just text the
guy and give him some sample questions he might want to ask. It'd be like a
magic button to privately deposition anybody you'd like.</sarcastically>

I apologize for the hair-on-fire reaction. Good grief, it's blatantly obvious
that the players here, both commercial and governmental, are going to push
this thing as hard as they possibly can until somebody stops them. I'm still
trying to figure out who somebody is going to be.

ADD: A plug: I rant about this often on my FB page. God knows I try to keep it
off HN but it's a long-lasting news story that's intricately related to the
things we do. (FB page is [https://www.facebook.com/Freedom-or-
Safety-405551942874575](https://www.facebook.com/Freedom-or-
Safety-405551942874575))

~~~
Kluny
Well, the historical response to being robbed by armed thugs is to get bigger
weapons and your own thugs. And in Texas, it's easier to get guns that it is
to get water (as far as I can tell, observing from Canada). The only thing I
don't understand is why an open shooting war between the police and the
citizens hasn't broken out already.

~~~
abawany
AFAICT, the citizenry that votes loves law enforcement and "tough"
regulations; the people most comfortable with guns are also in love with this
government. Further, voter turnout in the last major election was ~28% (or
34%, depending on whom you ask) so the ability to work the democracy angle is
quite limited.

The government keeps the populace happy by making noises related to "lowered
taxes", which is accompanied by the reality shown by this extortion gambit,
skyrocketing fines in general, and generally regressive taxation policies. It
is a sad state of affairs, no pun intended.

[http://www.dallasobserver.com/news/texas-had-the-worst-
voter...](http://www.dallasobserver.com/news/texas-had-the-worst-voter-
turnout-in-the-country-and-the-rain-in-dallas-didnt-help-7117659)

------
apaprocki
I had a friend in NYC just hit by a case of mistaken identify with ALPRs being
used by roving repo men looking to reclaim vehicles. It certainly isn't
restricted to the realm of law enforcement...

~~~
dopamean
They should be charged with grand larceny if they mistakenly removed his car.

~~~
tonyarkles
Am Canadian, so my legal understanding may not match American law. My
understanding of Canadian law is that that situation would not have had mens
rea (a guilty mind); the repo man was repossessing a car which he believed was
one that he was entitled to repossess. However, the repo man would like be
guilty of civil negligence and the owner court would ensure that the owner was
made whole (no towing fees, rental fees covered, maybe a bit of extra cash to
cover the hassle/lost work/whatever).

~~~
apaprocki
Basically the repo guy was negligent. They got a reader hit for a car they
were looking for and he just drove to that block and looked for a white make X
model Y and went up to the first one he found (my friend's) and tried to tell
him he was going to take the car without ever looking at the VIN #. The cops
were called and the guy admitted he never checked the VIN, which was obviously
not a match for what he was looking for.

~~~
tonyarkles
For sure... But was it civil negligence or criminal negligence? Civil
negligence is exactly what I'm talking about, with the courts coming up with
an adequate remedy to make the car owner whole.

In Canada, criminal negligence is defined as: "219 (1) Every one is criminally
negligent who

(a) in doing anything, or

(b) in omitting to do anything that it is his duty to do,

shows wanton or reckless disregard for the lives or safety of other persons."

It'd be a pretty hard sell here for him to meet that definition, but the
common law/civil definition would certainly fit.

------
jt2190
Forgive me my ignorance... What am I supposed to do with this information
other than get angry? (Double that for non-Texas residents.) What is the point
of this if there's no call to action?

 _I 'm a rage-aholic! I'm addicted to rage-ahol!!!"_ \-- Homer Simpson

~~~
GigabyteCoin
The EFF isn't a problem solver, they're a watch-dog.

Do what you will with the information they give you.

------
jkot
I live in Europe, we have similar problems but not at this level. I will just
add one quote from Greece:

> _New bill lowered fine from 400 euros to 50 euros, as long as offender
> presents vehicle at KTEO for inspection within 10 days of violation. Traffic
> wardens were hesitant to issue fines with debt crisis._

[http://livingingreece.gr/2007/04/20/fines-parking-tickets-
mo...](http://livingingreece.gr/2007/04/20/fines-parking-tickets-moving-
violations-greece/)

------
joesmo
Between this and cops simply stealing money, also known euphemistically as
asset forfeiture, it's a huge risk to drive anywhere these days. How can
ordinary, law-abiding citizens have respect for the law when the law is
written to specifically hurt them? I suppose on our way to fascism, privacy is
only a small bump in the road, barely even worth this comment.

~~~
Alupis
> How can ordinary, law-abiding citizens have respect for the law when the law
> is written to specifically hurt them

You do realize for the scenario to play out as-in the article, one must have
already broken the law and is therefore not a "law-abiding citizen".

~~~
marshray
I live in an area with all kinds of automated toll cameras.

I get unexpected bills in the mail all the time for simply going over a bridge
or unknowingly driving in the 'premium' fee lane.

Lose a little mail, wait a little time, and _bam_ you're a violator.

It's so common as to be a normal thing that people pick up traffic fines.

~~~
Alupis
> It's so common as to be a normal thing that people pick up traffic fines.

And so we should just not try to collect on legally owed fines imposed for
breaking the law?

> Lose a little mail, wait a little time, and bam you're a violator

If you had a due date to pay a fine... and you didn't pay that fine by the due
date... then yes, you're a violator. Not sure how that's not clear.

~~~
phil21
You're missing the point. Of course he has to pay. The punishment of spending
a night (or weekend, if you get unlucky) in jail so you can see a judge in the
morning is disproportionate to either losing or neglecting to pay a small
fine.

It should not be the choice between go to jail for the night, or pay a third
party private company an extra 25%.

Basically why does this exist? Those that can afford to generally pay these
fines eventually when they go to renew tabs/get pulled over/whatever. Those
that can't afford them won't pay them either way, and this just makes their
already shitty lives shittier by likely putting them out of work.

There were times I got to work and back barely making ends meet when I had
outstanding warrants for unpaid tickets. I did what I had to do to feed my
family, got back on my feet, and paid them off. Automated scanners at every
turn would have put me out of work, and minimum out of the bottom rungs of the
career I currently enjoy.

At some point you need to stop kicking people while their down, and use a
little common sense. Extorting them another 25% or ruining their lives is
ridiculous.

I agree you need a way to go after scofflaws, but the they are a very small
minority in a very wide sea of folks kind of caught up in a system they are
unlikely to get out of. If you think Payday loan stores are bad, just get in
debt to the government.

~~~
Karunamon
_It should not be the choice between go to jail for the night, or pay a third
party private company an extra 25%._

Considering how it works in literally every other state, where you're arrested
with no ifs ans or buts if you have outstanding violations on your record (and
have let them lapse that far)...

Okay, you want to _remove_ the ability for people to pay the fines on the
spot? Because that is literally the only difference here. An option where one
did not previously exist.

Now let me try to get in front of this thread. The answer to people being
between a rock and a hard place with regard to traffic fines is, quite simply,
to not get them in the first place, something which many people are able to do
remarkably well.

This is not a popular statement of fact, the response to which is usually a
list of edge cases about how someone didn't see they were in the HOV lane, or
rolled through the stop sign or did something else because "everyone else does
it", or whatever.

Okay, what's your answer to that? Don't give poor people tickets for breaking
the law / fine them less?

Bzzt. Unconstitutional on its face because equal protection, regardless of how
you view the 99%/1% class warfare issue.

So it sounds like we're attacking this from the wrong side. The problem is not
that perfectly legitimate fines are legally assessed and Bad Things happen to
you when you don't pay them. That is the system working as it's supposed to.

 _I agree you need a way to go after scofflaws, but the they are a very small
minority_

The cavalier attitude with which people treat basic rules of the road would
appear to indicate otherwise. You (again, random example) roll through a stop
sign because you don't think a cop is going to see it and the extra couple of
seconds are that important, you've rolled the dice with full knowledge and
consent.

Same thing if you're not paying attention and miss something you're obligated
to not miss. Well, it sucks, but you're in control of a multi-ton hunk of high
speed metal and paying attention to your surroundings is _kind of a big deal_.

Sometimes the dice don't go your way. I'm not sure it's possible to concoct a
law that is both constitutional in the sense of "the same laws/penalties for
everyone" and also adaptable to meet the needs of the violators.

Look at it this way - self driving cars are coming sooner rather than later,
and most of these things won't be a problem anymore.

~~~
arca_vorago
A bunch of strawman and other logical fallacies I hope people don't fall for.

"Okay, what's your answer to that? Don't give poor people tickets for breaking
the law / fine them less?

Bzzt. Unconstitutional on its face because equal protection, regardless of how
you view the 99%/1% class warfare issue."

How about just not charging such ridicilous fines, and stop creating warrants
for peoples arrests because they haven't payed a fucking fine? How about that
there Mr. I _kowtow to the totalitarian master_?

~~~
Karunamon
_stop creating warrants for peoples arrests because they haven 't payed a
fucking fine_

Our entire legal system (and indeed the legal system of most countries) is
based on incremental punishments for further noncompliance. You break the law,
you get fined. You don't pay the fine, you lose the associated privilege. You
ignore that loss, you go to jail.

This is _necessary_ to ensure compliance. Without this, the law may as well
not exist because people can violate it with absolute impunity.

 _How about just not charging such ridicilous fines_

"Ridiculous" in the case of someone below the poverty line could be as small
as a $20-$50 speeding/parking ticket.

The snark is not necessary or welcome, thanks.

------
samstave
This should also highlight Jobs' non-plated vehicle loophole that he used.

Eveyone should be using that loophole... oh wait you have to be the $1% in
order to afford such an exploit.

I recall getting a C&D order for making a comment on HN here a while back
warning of a particular company who was installing LPR devices at their HQ.

LPR is an insidious technology.

------
pm90
Holy crap this is alarming! I'm so glad that there are institutions like the
eff that can catch these kinds of practices and predict how they can be
mismanaged to serve rather ulterior motives.

As a side note, I have a sick feeling that this technology will be used to
exclusively target the most vulnerable of society. In fact, it provides an
incentive for police to patrol those neighborhoods, since they are (AFAIK)
more likely to have outstanding debts or unlikely to have the means to pay
them promptly.

------
ck2
25% tacked on ??? That's government enforced shakedowns.

------
imgabe
Are your movements in public really private information? "John Smith as seen
on the corner of 14th and Main Sts at 12pm today" doesn't really smack of
private info that needs to be protected.

Yes, someone could analyze all the data and learn about your habits, but to
what end? If you've got someone that dedicated to watching where you go, you
probably have a larger problem than just the information existing in a
database (i.e. a stalker, abusive ex, etc.) and that problem needs to be dealt
with.

Your location in public has always been publicly available to anyone near you,
it just wasn't recorded and stored.

~~~
ctrl_freak
The information becomes more private the more aggregated it gets. If you have
a stalker following you around everywhere, you can get a restraining order
against them. If detailed information of your locations were to be available
online, you couldn't stop anyone from looking at it.

~~~
imgabe
Looking at it and then what? If they _act_ on it by actually stalking you,
then yes, arrest them. We already have laws against that.

What harm comes to you by someone looking at a record of where you've been?

~~~
glitchdout
He can know when you leave and get home. Perfect time for a robbery.

~~~
imgabe
This is backwards from how robberies work. Burglars go to a neighborhood and
look for a house where nobody's home. They don't pick out a house before hand
and wait until it's empty.

Even if they did, why would they try to crack into a government database
instead of just sitting outside until you leave?

------
newman314
What is the accuracy rate on the ALPRs?

As anyone that has dealt with data on a large scale attest, data purity is
hard to maintain at scale and over time.

Vigilant has already had to issue apologies for incorrect warrants being
served. The consequences of "oops, my bad" are asymmetrical and not tilted in
favor of error. One might argue collateral damage but I do not believe this is
acceptable at all.

------
bloaf
>Anyone who is not an anarchist agrees with having a policeman at the corner
of the street; but the danger at present is that of finding the policeman
half-way down the chimney or even under the bed.

G. K. Chesterton, _What I Saw In America_ , 1922

------
analyst74
I have a mixed feeling about this.

On one hand, having law enforcements make money for private organizations
sound really terrible; on the other hand, letting people get away with
breaking rules will create a terrible culture that I experienced first hand.

A bit on the later, if the rules are too strict, or punishment(fines) too
high, then rules should be challenged/modified. Whereas if you create very
strict rules, but only enforce it selectively, either due to officer's
personal judgement or lack of policing resources, it creates incentive for
police officers to become corrupt, less deterrent for people breaking rules
and making bad rules more tolerable (because most people do not get personally
affected).

------
overcast
You could argue the "privacy" factor and I get it, but I don't really see a
problem with this. You're already registered with the state, and the license
plate identifies you. You chose to break, evade the law, and not pay your
fines. Everyone else obeys the law. So you get pulled over, pay the fine, and
be done with it.

I'd consider taking it a step further in the efficiency department. If someone
doesn't follow up with a ticket after ninety days or whatever, auto debit
their account. Thoughts?

~~~
jimbobimbo
That "efficiency department" wants 25% over the debt amount AND unlimited
usage of the collected data until it's "commercially viable". The latter part
is especially outrageous.

~~~
overcast
Any idea how much simple tickets cost after compounding for months/years?
They'll end up costing multiples of the original. This sounds like a win for
both sides.

~~~
jimbobimbo
Tickets should not be used for profit generation. It's a form of punishment
and determent.

Plus, for how long +25%? For the time it paid off the system or perpetually?
Is there a price on other "commercial" usage of collected data?

~~~
Eldarrion
Nobody said it's a 'lease to own' situation with the system. Never mind that
it includes computing time and server-side calculations and database access so
chances are it is a system that is simply being 'leased' to the police at the
cost of 25% added value to all transactions made possible through it.

------
pmorici
This is odd when juxtaposed with Texas's debt collection laws which are
extremely liberal.

------
Theodores
Although such behaviour has gone on in one way or another for as long as there
have been police/soldiers, this is not part of the Orwell 'Big Brother'
script. In most Dystopian futures the apparatus of Police state is paid for
with some type of other taxation, not the police officers doing highway
robbery.

------
marshray
Why is it the EFF reporting on this and not the ACLU?

------
dakotasmith
How feasible would it be to build a personal ALPR?

------
joshmn
Broke? Go to jail, that will sure help.

The system is so broken.

If they want to pull people over, great, let's set them up for success instead
of threatening to take away their liberties.

