May 28, 2026
Homework, but make it surveillance
More License Plate Reader Mission Creep: School Residency Verification, More
Parents stunned as school zone checks turn into full-on car tracking
TLDR: A privacy group says police camera systems meant to help solve crimes are now being used for everyday snooping, including checking whether families live in the right school district. Commenters are fixated on one jaw-dropping stat—240,000 searches with barely any useful results—and are asking why so many people are being tracked at all.
The internet is having a full privacy meltdown over a new EFF report claiming police and school officers are using automated license plate cameras—basically roadside cameras that log where cars go—for way more than chasing serious criminals. The biggest gasp? In Georgia’s Buford City Schools, officers reportedly used the system hundreds of times to check whether kids really lived in the district. Critics say that’s not a simple address check—it’s a map of a family’s life, from school runs to doctor visits to worship and vacations.
And the comments? Absolutely dragging the whole setup. The loudest reaction is some version of: you were told this was for dangerous crime, and now it’s being used for school paperwork and noise complaints? One commenter dropped the stat that their local police searched the database 240,000 times in a year, with only about 165 searches helping any case “in any way,” then asked the question now haunting the thread: what on earth was the other 99.8% for?
That single number became the community’s villain origin story. People mocked the idea of “crime-fighting tech” turning into a bureaucratic snooping machine, with jokes about getting tracked for existing too loudly or daring to drive near the wrong school zone. The hot take uniting the crowd is blunt: this looks less like targeted policing and more like everyone being watched just in case—and commenters are furious that something sold as public safety is starting to look like everyday surveillance creep.
Key Points
- •EFF says analysis of millions of police searches of Flock Safety ALPR data found agencies using the system beyond specific criminal investigations.
- •The article says ALPR systems capture vehicle plate numbers, vehicle details, and the date, time, and location of each sighting.
- •According to the article, ALPR searches have been used for low-level matters including school residency verification, employment background checks, loud music complaints, and a traffic-related inquiry involving a motorcyclist.
- •The article says broad inter-agency sharing allows ALPR systems to be searched across large networks, sometimes nationwide, resulting in very high search volumes.
- •EFF highlights Buford City Schools in Georgia, where school police conducted more than 375 residency-related ALPR searches between January 2025 and March 2026, including searches across more than 5,800 networks nationwide.