Reporters, community advocates, the **EFF**, and others have effectively used public records laws to expose and challenge abuse and misuse of data collected by automated license plate readers (**ALPRs**) by law enforcement. The **EFF** is now concerned about recent laws in several states that block public access to **ALPR** data, including information derived from it. They oppose pending bills in Arizona and Connecticut that would limit public oversight. ### The Power of Public Records Every state has laws, often called “freedom of information acts” (**FOIAs**) or “public records acts” (**PRAs**), that grant the public the right to obtain records from state and local governments. The **EFF** frequently advocates for robust public access and uses these laws to scrutinize government surveillance. However, lawmakers are introducing or enacting measures to exclude broad swaths of **ALPR** information from disclosure. This could include general information about law enforcement use, details on **ALPR** sharing across policing agencies, data on the number of license plate scans, where they happened, how many “hits” occurred, analyses on false matches, and images of vehicles. ### Transparency vs. Privacy The **EFF** acknowledges legitimate concerns about wholesale public disclosure of raw **ALPR** data, as this could exacerbate privacy harms. However, outright bans are not the answer. A balance between privacy and transparency is needed. **ALPR** data reveals sensitive information about a person's movements, making it dangerous for the police to possess such extensive data. Disclosing this information to employers, political opponents, or corporations would be even worse. The **EFF's** experience using public records from **ALPR** systems demonstrates the strong accountability value of public access to data-sharing reports and network audits. For example, the **EFF's** “Data Driven” series used **ALPR** data-sharing and hit ratio reports to investigate data sharing between police departments and analyze the number of **ALPR** scans associated with a crime-related vehicle. They have also identified racist uses of **ALPR** systems, **ALPR** surveillance of protestors, and **ALPR** tracking of individuals seeking abortions. Municipalities have been shutting down their contracts for **ALPR** use, citing concerns with data sharing. These records are leverage for communities, journalists, and local officials to block new deployments, refuse contract renewals, and terminate agreements with surveillance vendors. Without this evidence, it is harder for cities to exercise their procurement power. ### Finding the Right Balance The best approach is for public records laws to contain a privacy exemption that requires balancing the transparency benefits versus the privacy costs of disclosure on a case-by-case basis. These provisions already accommodate concerns about disclosing personal information collected by the government. Applying this balance to **ALPR** records, it may be appropriate to disclose some information and withhold other information. Individuals should generally have access to records showing their own movements, but not access to similar records about everyone else. Releasing unredacted data and images of vehicles engaged in non-sensitive government business may be appropriate, while releasing scans of a government social worker visiting clients would not. Public records laws should allow a requester to obtain some **ALPR** information about government surveillance in a way that accommodates both transparency and privacy. For example, disclosing the times and places that plate data was collected, but not the plate data itself. Disclosing aggregated and/or deidentified **ALPR** data protects individual privacy. Aggregation or de-identification of databases are redactions in service of individual privacy. Likewise, in a government audit log of police searches of stored **ALPR** data, it will often be appropriate to disclose an officer’s investigative purposes to conduct a search.