State lawmakers should ban creepy license plate readers in Pennsylvania [editorial] | Our Opinion

THE ISSUE

State lawmakers on both sides of the aisle in Harrisburg have expressed interest in restricting or outright banning automated license plate readers, artificial intelligence-enabled camera systems that record the license plate numbers and other information of passing vehicles and store that information in databases.

In 2026, it appears that there is at least one issue on which Democrats and Republicans agree: the need to rein in the use of automated license plate readers that track the movements of vehicles — and so, in effect, track the movements of all of us as we drive around and conduct our lives.

The American Civil Liberties Union explains how automated license plate readers differ from regular traffic cameras: “This surveillance technology records and tracks every car that comes into view, and then an AI algorithm catalogs the make, model, color, license plate number, bumper stickers, and even scratches. This personal information is then uploaded into a nationwide database.”

They’re generally referred to as “Flock cameras” because many are manufactured by a company called Flock Safety, but as the ACLU notes, Flock is not the only company “trying to make a buck by spying on us. … It doesn’t matter which company has its creepy cameras in your neighborhood; they all have the same problems: a lack of transparency, oversight, and regulation into how they collect, store, and use our data, and how to hold public and private actors accountable if they abuse it.”

The grassroots advocacy group DeFlock the USA had identified 26 of these cameras in Lancaster County as of Tuesday. A map of automated license plate readers compiled by that group shows that police departments and corporations have installed cameras in Manheim Township, as well as in East Hempfield and East Lampeter townships. Among the 52 Pennsylvania counties where DeFlock the USA verified at least one plate reader, Lancaster County ranked 23rd for the number of cameras per resident.

As LNP | LancasterOnline reported, fixed license plate readers were installed by Motorola at entrances to the Shoppes at Belmont in Manheim Township in spring 2026.

Police departments generally have supported the installation of these cameras because of their usefulness in identifying traffic violations and investigating crime. Automated license plate readers have helped to resolve Amber Alerts and, as The New York Times reported, have provided “critical leads in a number of high-profile cases,” including the manhunt for the man sentenced to life in prison for plotting to assassinate President Donald Trump at one of his Florida golf courses in 2024.

Unfortunately, license plate readers are ripe for misuse.

The Institute for Justice, a libertarian nonprofit law firm, has cataloged more than 200 incidents of automated license plate reader abuse, including stalking and wrongful stops and detentions. Some of the cases involved police searching for a spouse’s name, for instance, or for the name of a former romantic partner, for reasons unrelated to law enforcement.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation points out that these cameras also have been used to “surveil protests, which can chill First Amendment-protected dissent.”

That civil liberties nonprofit obtained Flock Safety’s license plate reader search data through public records requests. It found that with “no warrant requirements, limited guardrails, and deficient audit processes,” the databases “have fostered a culture of unrestricted access to everyone’s location information. This culture of abuse has allowed police to treat a mass surveillance network like their own personal search engine, permitting the tracking of the movements of everyday citizens for low-level complaints, personal whims, and sometimes, seemingly, for the lols.”

As LNP | LancasterOnline reported, some states such as Florida and Texas “have stopped funding for Flock cameras or ordered them to be removed from highways in the past few months.” And Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro has signaled his support for legislation to restrict automated license plate readers.

State Sen. Chris Gebhard, a Republican whose 48th Senate District includes the northern tip of Lancaster County, is co-sponsoring legislation being crafted by Erie County Republican Sen. Dan Laughlin that would ban networked, AI-powered automated license plate readers that catalog vehicles in a searchable database.

“Once that surveillance network is built, there is no guarantee it will only be used in ways we find acceptable today,” Laughlin said.

That is precisely the danger and why it must be addressed.

As Democratic state Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta of North Philadelphia stated in a co-sponsorship memo declaring his intent to introduce legislation banning automated license plate readers in the commonwealth, it “is of paramount importance that we protect Pennsylvanians’ privacy from this threat.”

State Sen. James Malone, a Democrat representing the 36th District covering much of northern Lancaster County, told LNP | LancasterOnline that there should be only “a narrow set of circumstances” in which law enforcement employs license plate readers, such as when seeking stolen vehicles or missing people.

Automated license plate readers are indiscriminate in their collection of vehicle information. As the Electronic Frontier Foundation notes, they “automatically capture all license plate numbers that come into view, along with the location, date, and time. The data, which includes photographs of the vehicle and sometimes its driver and passengers, is then uploaded to a central server. … Taken in the aggregate, (automated license plate reader) data can paint an intimate portrait of a driver’s life.”

And the technology can be used “to target drivers who visit sensitive places such as health centers, immigration clinics, gun shops, union halls, protests, or centers of religious worship.”

As that foundation points out, drivers are required by law to exhibit license plates on their vehicles. There’s no opting out of this requirement.

While it’s true that we’re being tracked by all kinds of technology — most notably by some of the apps on our smartphones and by internet cookies — none of us have consented to being tracked by automated license plate readers.

“Public safety is a responsibility we all take seriously, but it should not require building a permanent surveillance network capable of tracking the daily movements of millions of innocent people,” Laughlin told LNP | LancasterOnline via email. “I do not believe the benefits outweigh that risk.”

They certainly do not.

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