DEA installs license-plate recognition devices. Can the POI file be far behind?

If used only for the purposes stated, I'm in favor of it.

Philadelphia has been using the devices for awhile, to help find cars that have unpaid tickets. Don't see any problems there.

Part of that story:

"In the past, Arizonans have drawn a line in the sand by expressing their discontent with a similar technology—speed cameras—used for traffic enforcement. Angry drivers reportedly disarmed them with axes and covered the cameras with sticky notes and boxes. Others simply left tickets unpaid, and in one extreme 2009 case, a technician responsible for maintaining the cameras was shot to death. The state’s Department of Public Safety pulled the plug on them in 2010."

Heh.

What's so different about the units the DEA is using than those used by many police departments around the country that log where and when a car is parked or enters a facility, toll booths, private parking lots, speed and red light cameras and the many other places where records of license plates are kept?

There is no difference. The evil that they can do is not in the collection, but in the use of the data.

I certainly hope the POI Factory admins would not allow this POI. It is like a Border Patrol Checkpoint POI. It has no honest use.

There can't be a POI for that for the city of Des Moines (other cities are also using them) has two units in training mounted on cars that read license plates as they drive the streets. This is to get stolen cars or license plates.
Since the right wing Supreme court has told us that we have no right to expect privacy in public places it is legal for police to keep track of cars in public places.
The only answer is to plead the 5th if one is asked why you were there.

In addition to toll roads, and check points, many city police departments have this thing mounted on patrol car to check wants and warrants all the time. A POI only on DEA devices seems pointless.

We all want the convenience of improving technology. But we don't have the ability to limit the uses of that technology to what we feel is "appropriate".

I'm sure many people could not "live" without their SmartPhones, GPS unit or other electronic devices. And all of these conveniences could easily be converted into surviellance devices to spy on us by the Bad Guys .

The small city of Glen Cove, NY, just north of me, has license plate scanners installed on one route for months now and is going to be adding more. At night, you can see a reddish glow from the camera lens which is probably the IR light.

Links to two news stories about them:

http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2012/02/21/some-concerned-about-...

http://glencove.patch.com/articles/glen-cove-ave-cameras-rec...