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Tiburon to Photograph License Plates of All Cars Entering Town

By Alex in Car & Vehicle, Crime & Law, Travel & Places on Nov 23, 2009 at 3:33 am


Tiburon, California, has become the first community in the United States to record the license plate of every car that enter or leave the town:

Plates will be compared to databases of stolen or wanted cars, with matches triggering an immediate alert to local officers. If detectives are investigating a crime, they will be able to search the records to try to find possible suspects. [...]

"If it lowers the crime rate even a little bit, then it’s a great idea," said Yami Anolik, a 64-year-old real estate investor whose husband, Al Anolik, spoke in favor of the cameras at the meeting.

She said she did not share the privacy concerns of some of her neighbors, explaining, "If you’re driving on a public road, you gave up your privacy already. If you want to be private, stay at home."

Do you think this is a good idea? Link
(Photo: CJ Sorg [Flickr])


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COMMENT
  1. Briannana
    Nov 23rd, 2009 at 5:25 am

    Those who sacrifice liberty for safety deserve neither. Benjamin Franklin

  2. ted
    Nov 23rd, 2009 at 7:44 am

    "every car that enters or leaves the town"

    or

    "all the cars that enter or leave the town"

  3. Manticore
    Nov 23rd, 2009 at 8:32 am

    *facepalm*

  4. zavatone
    Nov 23rd, 2009 at 9:39 am

    Tiburon's an interesting and super wealthy place. I think they can afford to do this just to make sure things stay safe. I'm not saying it's right or not, but there's a standard way in and a standard way out. The weekend gets a tourist/drinking crowd that comes by car and ferry and the road traffic leaving can be brutal. I can see why they would want to do this. You've got to spend time drinking at Sam's to really understand.

  5. remf3
    Nov 23rd, 2009 at 10:28 am

    I would be upset if this was a real town and not Tiburon. This is just a good for them to keep the undesirables out. The undesirables being brown skinned people who aren't working on the lawn. Tiburon is a place for the rich, white, liberal Marin NIMBY.

  6. VSBM
    Nov 23rd, 2009 at 11:26 am

    I'm all for it! ....just as long as I get to go into the home of every city council member of Tiburon and photograph their possessions. You know, to make sure none of it is stolen.

  7. zeytoun
    Nov 23rd, 2009 at 11:29 am

    While, on the surface, I generally agree with the reasoning that data collection in public is benign to privacy concerns.

    However, the more and more "benign" information that is collected, pooled and analyzed by the government, the more power they are allocating to themselves. In the pursuit of justice, this is still benign.

    However, should there be corruption in the process, an individual life could be significantly hampered by someone with access to lots of correlated, "benign" data.

    Therefore, the important thing to me should be to push for at least one of the following 3 things.

    (1) When possible, every time we allocate power to the goverment, or other large imaginary entities, that we simultaneously allocate power to the public (for example, provide access to this data to everyone, about everyone)

    (2) All new information resources must be accompanied by checks to access to information, to prevent corruption. (like the FISA courts, for example)

    (3) or the new power should be avoided.

  8. required
    Nov 23rd, 2009 at 1:05 pm

    FYI: Anyone can photograph things. Heck look at Google, they have filmed everyone's homes, streets, so on and so forth. If you are afraid of someone or something taking a picture of your plate, remain in the boondocks.

  9. Gauldar
    Nov 23rd, 2009 at 1:11 pm

    @required

    I always found that amusing. If a private company does it, it's ok (or just complained about at most), but if the government has any hand in it's blown out of proportion that everyone's rights have been taken away. Just tell them it's to help prevent people from bringing illegals over the border and they will be all for it.

  10. Bryan C
    Nov 23rd, 2009 at 1:29 pm

    "I always found that amusing. If a private company does it, it's ok (or just complained about at most), but if the government has any hand in it's blown out of proportion that everyone's rights have been taken away."

    That's because private companies (composed of private individuals) have all the same natural rights you and I have, whereas the government has only the powers granted to it by us. Also, Google can't take our property or put us in jail, but the government can.

    That said, while I agree that this is bad policy it has nothing to do with "privacy". Privacy is not a cloaking device. Your license plate and the auto registration information it references are not private. Your location on a public road is not private. Going that direction leads to madness, like cranks who try to sue photographers for taking a picture of them on a crowded city street.

  11. Vemba Tsith
    Nov 23rd, 2009 at 1:55 pm

    actually, Medina WA started doing this back on Sep 16, 2009. Medina is where Bill Gates lives.

  12. Gauldar
    Nov 23rd, 2009 at 2:24 pm

    @Bryan C

    Put in jail for what? Chances are if they are putting someone in jail, it's for a good reason.

    @Vemba Tsith

    Yeah, I heard about that. Bill Gates has been known to tag people's plates who have knock-off copies of Windows, then follows people home and then eats their baby.

  13. Wes
    Nov 23rd, 2009 at 3:50 pm

    "I'm all for it! ....just as long as I get to go into the home of every city council member of Tiburon and photograph their possessions. You know, to make sure none of it is stolen."

    I can't even begin to explain the total lack of correlation here.

  14. Ericker
    Nov 23rd, 2009 at 4:30 pm

    I currently live in the Bay Area and this is the type of stuff that is making me hate this state more and more each day. This place is turning into a police state and no one seems to care. I need to get out of here before you have to have your papers in order to walk down the street or face the wrath of the gestapo.

  15. Dylyn
    Nov 23rd, 2009 at 5:56 pm

    My English teacher talks about this "Big Brother" type of stuff all the time. In fact this one time he said that it starts like this because, "If a person is asked to put a wire on them they'll say 'Sure! I'm not guilty, do what you please!' and then when the government wants to put a microchip in their baby's head to track their life the same person will go 'Sure my kids not gonna do anything wrong, go right ahead.'" But, my English teacher is a HUGE hippie! I do agree with VSBM too!!!!

  16. Bearfoot
    Nov 23rd, 2009 at 7:46 pm

    What we need to do is to get as many people as we possibly can to start taking pictures of her in public and use her "you're in public, you gave up all rights to privacy" BS excuse against her.

    I'd be willing to bet her tone would change quickly.

  17. pwscott
    Nov 23rd, 2009 at 8:17 pm

    Good idea? Maybe. It could get some of the crap off the street. :p

  18. Wes
    Nov 23rd, 2009 at 11:13 pm

    Bearfoot, the truth is, legally, when you're in a public setting, you don't have a reasonable expectation of privacy. What you're talking about on the other hand, is premeditated harassment.

  19. jm1656
    Nov 24th, 2009 at 12:49 pm

    we are becoming England, this is not good.

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