Internal FBI documents obtained by the ACLU show that doubts have been raised within the Bureau regarding the use of automated license plate readers. The newly revealed documents also suggest that the Bureau has developed a policy for the technology to address privacy concerns. But that document remains unjustly secret, as do most all details on the FBI’s license plate reader program.

The newly revealed government records do suggest that the FBI’s Video Surveillance Unit (VSU) has a fleet of license plate readers that it lends to its local field offices. We have no information about the types of investigations carried out with this technology. Have FBI field offices deployed license plate readers to gather intelligence on Arab and Muslim communities? To watch over Occupy or Black Lives Matter protesters? The extremely limited information released to the public does not answer these or many other possible questions.

Automatic license plate readers are a sophisticated way of tracking drivers’ locations, and when their data is aggregated over time they can paint detailed pictures of people’s lives. Effective and transparent regulation and oversight are critical if the FBI is to continue to develop and buy license plate readers for FBI programs around the country. The FBI’s own lawyers seemed to agree, at least in part. An email exchange from June 2012 shows that the FBI temporarily stopped its purchases of license plate readers based on advice from its Office of General Counsel, which indicated that it was “wrestling with LPR privacy issues.” The documents do not show what “privacy issues” were identified or what happened next.

Part of the problem may have been that the FBI began its license plate reader program without any policies in place regulating their use. Emails in July 2012 explain that the FBI was struggling to develop a policy on license plate readers.

https://www.aclu.org/blog/free-future/internal-documents-show-fbi-was-wrestling-license-plate-scanner-privacy-issues