Connecticut
Your daily movements should not be someone else’s database.
A grassroots movement
We’re a bi-partisan, grassroots movement working to eliminate Automated License Plate Readers (ALPR) mass surveillance in towns across Connecticut. Learn how ALPRs pose risks for everyone and get engaged to protect your rights.
Some facts first
ALPR systems record your license plate, vehicle characteristics, timestamp, and location each time you pass a camera. This data is used to build an AI-searchable dossier of your movement patterns. The data is shared with (and even sold to) other local and federal law enforcement agencies and third parties. These systems are dragnets that track everyone to find needles in a haystack.
Unlike red-light or speed cameras, towns do not have to undergo public disclosure or input before installing ALPRs. Most people don't even know they're being watched. We are paying to be surveilled without our consent. West Hartford's system costs $65k+ annually in taxpayer money and was initially funded with a $500k federal grants.
140,000+
ALPR cameras are now spread across the United States, powered by cheap AI and big money. The advent of cheap AI is fueling maximal data collection (audio, video and other electronic data) that can be searched later for much more than just license plates.
ALPRs are deployed across Connecticut. 50+ towns have deployed ALPR - not all towns have it. Many towns are re-evaluating.
See camera locations (note: due to lack of transparency, not all cameras have been mapped)ALPRs gather tons of data about our daily lives. It poses similar 4th amendment concerns as cell phone location data that SCOTUS recently decided on in Chatrie v. United States. Even more, this form of mass surveillance puts innocent people in dangerous situations due to errors and is prone to abuse. Congresspeople have even raised concerns about national security risks.
153 cities nationwide have decided to stop using ALPR, including Connecticut's very own Windsor and Killingworth.
Peter Thiel's Founders Fund is among its capital backers. Thiel has some weird ideas about the world that necessitate instituting a surveillance superstate "that operates outside the checks and balances of representative democracy as described in high school textbooks.”
Surveillance companies' profit motives go beyond serving public interest. FLock Safety in particular has a pattern of deceiving public decisionmakers. The Flock CEO has had to walk back politically dangerous labels and is such a liar his own Chief Comms Officer has had to publicly distance himself from his boss's statements! Are these the kind of people you trust your private data with?
The bottom line
There are no independent studies showing that ALPR surveillance reduce crime or improve law enforcement clearance rates. Meanwhile, data from Atlanta show that AI mass surveillance has little to no effect. But efficacy isn't the point: AI driven mass surveillance represents real value to for-profit tech companies and a federal government racing toward authoritarianism.
The future of AI mass surveillance in your town should be decided through a democratic process with public input.
Take the next stepThings you can do next
