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West Colfax Avenue at Irving Street, July 12, 2023.
Kevin J. Beaty/Denverite
Denver Police Department’s new network of license plate readers scanned vehicles more than 2 million times in the last month, according to new data from the department.
DPD launched the system of 95 surveillance cameras throughout the city in May 2024. Today, the department published a dashboard with basic data on the system for the public.
Among the 2,072,000 vehicles detected in the last 30 days, the system reported about 86,000 hits to a “hotlist,” often because the plate was for a stolen car. The system looks for vehicles tagged in national and state-level crime databases, as well as the Amber Alert system for missing and exploited children.
Law enforcement officers ran about 1,400 searches on the Denver system in the last month.
The system used by DPD is made by Flock Safety, a technology company that has become one of the most popular in the niche for both police departments and private homeowners associations. The company describes its technology as a “holistic solution to crime.” It has drawn criticism from civil rights and anti-surveillance advocates.
DPD says that the system has been effective. Officers have used the system in the arrests of 142 crime suspects and the recovery of about 100 stolen vehicles, as well as some weapons.
This year has seen a significant decrease of motor vehicle thefts, which police attributed in part to the system — but that trend also began before the system was installed in May.
Eventually, the number of cameras could grow to 111 around Denver. The system photographs license plates but doesn’t produce any information about drivers, passengers, or other people, according to Flock. The data is “never sold to 3rd parties” and is “used for law enforcement purposes only,” according to Flock.
The cameras were planned for some of the city’s busiest roads, like Federal Boulevard, Alameda Avenue and Speer Boulevard — and especially Colfax Avenue, 9News reported.
DPD didn’t immediately respond to questions about the cost of the system.
Cities including Arvada, Aurora, Brighton, Castle Rock, Commerce City, Edgewater, Erie, Glendale, Lakewood, Northglenn, Thornton and Wheat Ridge have installed (or plan to install) similar systems, according to Denver7.
The American Civil Liberties Union has raised concerns about the scanners, saying that they were contributing to a “giant surveillance network” that centralizes data and could enable “abuse by government,” including tracking political dissidents.
“We have long had concerns about the dangers posed by hybrid public-private surveillance practices — but Flock threatens to take that to a new level,” the ACLU wrote in 2022.
Those kinds of surveillance concerns led Elbert County to cancel its contract with Flock, the Elbert County News reported.
Numerous other law-enforcement agencies around Colorado have access to the Denver system’s data. But the system is prohibited for use in immigrant enforcement, traffic enforcement, personal use, and more, according to Flock.
Questions or comments? Let us know at [email protected].
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