EFF Austin urges Technology Commission to oppose automated license-plate readers, citing privacy and contract concerns

Kevin Welch, board president of EFF Austin, told the Austin Technology Commission on July 9 that automated license-plate readers, or ALPRs, are “a mass surveillance technology because they canvas an entire area indiscriminately by gathering information about where people were at certain times without a warrant, probable cause, or evidence of criminal wrongdoing.”

Welch gave a 90-minute presentation and Q&A on the city’s yearlong ALPR pilot and the role of private vendors, including Flock, in operating the system used by Austin Police Department (APD). He said the pilot logged about 75 million plate reads in a year and that only “0.02 percent” of those reads returned matches to the vendor hot lists. He told commissioners that the pilot’s audit and contract language raised “stunning” legal and privacy concerns, notably a contract clause that he said gave the vendor “a nonexclusive, perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty free, fully paid license to use, reproduce, modify, and distribute…