The Associated Press reports:
Privacy advocates are criticizing a new surveillance system used by South Portland police that reads license plates, a system police defend as a tool to help solve crimes, find wanted individuals, and locate missing people.
[S]tate Senator Dennis Damon, a Trenton Democrat, said he is concerned that the system could be used to gather information about residents and that police could drive through a lot and record all the vehicles parked there…. Damon has introduced legislation, presented to him by the Maine Civil Liberties Union, to ban technology that’s used to gather broad information about private citizens.
Similar systems are used in about 25 states. South Portland police bought the system last fall with help from a federal grant.
Read more in The Boston Globe.