A new lawsuit by local advocacy groups alleges San Jose’s use of data collected by automated license plate readers deployed around town violates drivers’ privacy rights
The lawsuit, filed Tuesday in Santa Clara County Superior Court, takes aim at the city’s practice of allowing the San Jose Police Department to search a vast database of license plate and vehicle images without a warrant. The plaintiffs warn the data — which is used to aid police investigations and can be stored for up to a year — could be used to track drivers’ movements throughout San Jose. In their legal complaint, plaintiffs allege this violates the California Constitution ban on unreasonable searches, as well as its guarantee of privacy rights.
“Normally, that kind of location information is protected and requires that a government who wants to access that information obtain a warrant,” Nick Hidalgo, a staff attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Northern California, said. “But here, San Jose accesses all of that information, many, many times a month, and it does so without a warrant.”
The ACLU is partnering with the Electronic Frontier Foundation to bring the case, which names San Jose, Mayor Matt Mahan and Police Chief Paul Joseph as defendants. The civil liberties organizations filed the lawsuit on behalf of two nonprofit groups — Services, Immigrant Rights and Education Network and the Council on American-Islamic Relations. Both have offices in the South Bay.
“Automated license plate readers are an incredibly invasive mass dragnet surveillance tool,” Hidalgo told San José Spotlight. “Just for this information to be collected and compiled — it is causing people to fear that they are being tracked and monitored everywhere.”
Numerous police departments across California have been granted access to San Jose’s database, including neighboring cities Campbell, Gilroy and Milpitas. Plaintiffs are asking the court to restrict access to the data by requiring law enforcement agencies to first obtain a warrant before conducting a search.
San José Spotlight reached out to the mayor’s office, the San Jose Police Department and the City Attorney’s Office. All declined to comment on the pending litigation. However, Assistant City Attorney Kevin Fisher defended San Jose’s data privacy policies used to manage access to the license plate information.
“Pursuant to state law, we have built in robust data privacy and security measures throughout our (automated license plate reader) system, including regular deletion of collected data that is not being actively used in an investigation,” Fisher told San José Spotlight.
The city also prohibits the use of the database for investigating a person’s immigration status or for monitoring legally protected activities like protests or rallies. While California law enforcement agencies can search San Jose’s database without a warrant, police officials must provide a “legitimate law enforcement purpose” to do so, Fisher said.
San Jose has long equipped police patrol vehicles with automated license plate readers, but in 2022 the city began deploying the surveillance technology in fixed locations for the first time. The rollout came as a response to several high-profile robberies and thefts at retail stores, including upscale Westfield Valley Fair Shopping Mall that straddles the cities of San Jose and Santa Clara.
To date, San Jose has deployed a total of 472 automated license plate readers, according to an online dashboard maintained by the city’s camera vendor, Atlanta-based firm Flock Safety. The city has focused its deployment along accident-prone thoroughfares and at intersections next to crime hot spots, including shopping areas.
Backers say the cameras have helped to compensate for SJPD’s low staffing levels, providing crucial leads in a variety of criminal cases. Those have included fatal hit and runs, and the attempted murder of a police officer, police officials said.
In a statement, Mahan also defended the city’s use of the technology.
“While we take seriously our responsibility for data privacy and security,” Mahan said, “we can’t let fear of new tools get in the way of the safety of our families, especially given that this system is a big part of the reason we’ve solved 100% of homicides over the past three years.”
Civil rights groups have been tracking the proliferation of license plate cameras in cities throughout California for decades, Hidalgo said. Still, he argued, the scale of San Jose’s deployment makes the city stand out.
Plaintiffs said their review of public records found that the San Jose Police Department searched for driver locations more than 260,000 times over the course of the year following June 2024. They also found that the city’s license plate readers collect the images of more than 2 million plates each month.
Zahra Billoo, who leads the Bay Area chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, said surveillance at this scale is cause for alarm for the communities her organization represents.
“This is not just about data or technology — it’s about power, accountability, and our right to move freely without being watched,” Billoo said. “For Muslim communities, and for anyone who has experienced profiling, the knowledge that police can track your every move without cause is chilling.”
Contact Keith Menconi at [email protected] or @KeithMenconi on X.
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