Boston Police Store License Plate Data For “Intelligence” Purposes

Kade Crockford writes:

This summer ACLU affiliates all around the country filed open-records requests seeking information about how government agencies are using automated license plate readers. One set of records, released this week to the ACLU of Massachusetts by the police department here in Boston, provides a snapshot of the data-collection practices that are taking place around the nation.

The records reveal that the Boston police collect an average of 3,630 license plate reads per day and store the information for 90 days, unless officers decide they want to hold onto it forever, “for investigatory or intelligence purposes and for discovery/exculpatory evidence.”