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Over the last decade, California has built up some of the nation鈥檚 strongest driver privacy protections, thanks to the hard work of activists, civil rights groups, and elected leaders.

One law in particular, often called , prohibits police from circulating detailed maps of people鈥檚 driving patterns with the federal government and agencies in other states鈥� a protection that has only grown more important with the end of Roe v. Wade and the subsequent surge in abortion criminalization.

But dozens of California police departments have decided to defy the law, even after receiving from California Attorney General Rob Bonta, the chief law enforcement officer in the state. Last month the ACLU of Northern California and our partners listing 35 police agencies that have refused to comply with the law and protect driver privacy.

We should all be able to drive to a doctor鈥檚 office, place of worship, or political rally without being tracked and cataloged by police agencies. But for years now, police have used automated license plate readers (ALPRs) to record and track the movements of drivers on a previously unseen scale. These systems allow police to collect and store information about drivers whose cars pass through ALPR cameras鈥� fields of view, which, along with the date and time of capture, can reveal sensitive details about our movements and, as a result, our private lives.

The ACLU has long seen the danger ALPR surveillance poses, and working alongside communities on the ground, has fought to bolster California鈥檚 legal protections for driver privacy. For over a decade, we have conducted investigations, advocacy, and litigation focused on how police agencies use ALPR to track law-abiding drivers, amass hordes of sensitive information, and use it to harm people.

In the wake of on ALPR across the US, police use of ALPRs in 2013 as a threat to driver privacy and warned that California lacked statewide driver privacy protections. In 2016, thanks in part to the advocacy of the ACLU and , the California legislature passed , the law at issue today. In 2019 we discovered Immigration and Customs Enforcement鈥檚 (ICE) exploitation of ALPR-collected information to track and target immigrants in California and across the United States.

From there, we took action to enforce California鈥檚 driver privacy protections. In we sued Marin County, California for illegally sharing millions of local drivers鈥� license plates and locations with federal and out-of-state agencies, including ICE. The sheriff eventually agreed to comply with SB 34 as part of a , but we believed that many other California police agencies were still violating SB 34.

We rang the alarm again in the wake of the Dobbs decision overturning Roe v. Wade. Alongside our partners at the Electronic Frontier Foundation and ACLU of Southern California, we demanding they stop sharing people鈥檚 driving patterns with states that have criminalized abortion care. We also notified the attorney general鈥檚 office of these violations.

Following our letters, the attorney general issued to police across the state to follow SB 34鈥檚 plain text and cease sharing license plate information with state and federal agencies outside California. While some agencies have come into compliance, many police are digging in and refusing to follow the law. Police lobbyists have even the attorney general to withdraw his interpretation of the law.

Simply put, the position touted by police agencies and their lobbyists puts Californians at risk. SB 34 is important because when police track and share the locations of law-abiding drivers, that information can easily be used to facilitate racist policing, , and the of people in California and beyond. And, as , when California shares ALPR information with authorities in states with anti-abortion or anti-trans laws, police and prosecutors gain new power to track and prosecute people who traveled to California to receive reproductive or gender-affirming care.

We should all be able to travel safely on the state鈥檚 roads without our movements being handed to authorities outside the state. That is why we have continued to push California police agencies to follow California鈥檚 driver privacy law. And it鈥檚 why we have supported localities ALPR programs at odds with their values.

It is unacceptable that police agencies charged with enforcing laws are refusing to comply with this one. While we are pleased with Attorney General Bonta鈥檚 strong statement on SB 34, we urge the attorney general to use all available means at his disposal to ensure compliance. And rest assured, that the ACLU will continue fighting to enact and enforce protections that keep all of us safe, no matter where we go in the state.

This article was on the blog of the ACLU of Northern California.