CANADIANS WHO DRIVE IN THE U.S. COULD SOON GET CAUGHT ON CAMERAS HIDDEN IN ROADSIDE SPEED SIGNS. THE DRUG ENFORCEMENT AGENCY SAYS IT’S TARGETING TRAFFICKERS. PRIVACY EXPERTS SAY THE LENS IS WIDER.
U.S. DEA plans to gather data with roadside readers
Canadian drivers who venture south of the border can soon expect to have their licence plate logged surreptitiously by the United States’ newest public surveillance tool: roadside speed signs.
The U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency plans to expand efforts to track licence plates around the country by concealing recognition technology inside digital displays that indicate the speed at which a vehicle is travelling.
In addition to fulfilling their chief purpose — warning speeders to slow down — the retrofitted versions of these signs will capture plate information that law enforcement agencies can store for future reference.
“Everybody who drives on a road and passes one of those signs can probably assume their licence plate has been captured,” said Brenda McPhail, a privacy and surveillance expert at the Canadian Civil Liberties Association. “The thing that’s very troubling about the American program is that it’s being done covertly and indiscriminately.”
The implication for travellers isn’t Canada’s only connection to the DEA’s platetracking program. A DEA official, who asked to not be named because they aren’t authorized to speak publicly on the matter, confirmed that the agency has purchased plate-reading equipment from Genetec, a security technology company headquartered in Montreal, though they said those readers may not, in the end, be used as part of this speed sign rollout.
Genetec spokesman Kevin Clark said most of Genetec’s clients don’t tell the company how they intend to use the equipment they buy. “It’s none of our business,” he said, adding that legislative bodies are responsible for considering privacy and security issues in data collection, such as how information is encrypted and how long it is kept.
“We’re a company that makes software and hardware for customers,” Clark said. “We do create the software so that it can be set to auto-erase, auto-delete data or information from any archiving.”
In its annual budget, the DEA says the main reason it tracks licence plate data is to help federal, state and local law enforcement officials identify and thwart drug traffickers and money launderers. It’s an extension of the logic police forces employ to justify their everyday use of plate readers.
Police, including forces in Ontario and B.C., use licence plate readers to spot drivers with an outstanding warrant or offence. Typically, the cameras that register plate data are mounted in plain sight on top of a cruiser.
The B.C. government, for example, says it can help police nab suspended, uninsured or unlicensed drivers and vehicles wanted in theft or Amber Alert investigations by cross-checking plate data with information from provincial and national databases.
Municipal and private parking authorities also use the technology to scan for cars that haven’t paid the meter. Worksites use it for access control, flagging unauthorized vehicles and allowing those that are approved onto their property. Some airports track plates as a means of guarding against terrorism.
Broadly, though, the practice has drawn the ire of people who claim that licence plate recognition is a form of mass surveillance. To David Fraser, a privacy lawyer in Halifax, the issue with the DEA’s new scheme is that it sets its lens so wide as to capture anyone who drives by a hidden plate reader, not just vehicles suspected of funnelling illicit goods.
“It may well be that there’s one person who goes by that sign in a day who is a drug dealer, but the reality is there are probably tens of thousands of people who are completely innocent who go past that sign,” Fraser said. “You end up collecting a large amount of information from individuals who have nothing to do with anything.”
Citing the sensitivity of any investigation it might undertake, the DEA declined to specify the regions or roads where its readerequipped speed signs will be positioned, as well as the dates the signs will be installed.
For its part, the Communications Security Establishment, Canada’s electronic surveillance agency, says it doesn’t track licence plates because it is prohibited by law from directing intelligence or cyber-defence operations at any Canadian or person in Canada. The Canadian Security Intelligence Service didn’t reply to a request for comment.