The Fairfax County Police Department joined over 2,000+ law enforcement agencies, neighborhoods, and commercial centers that are using the Flock Safety License Plate Reader system. The use of license plate readers has been prevalent in law enforcement for decades. In 2008, Fairfax County began using the technology to identify stolen vehicles, stolen license plates, wanted persons, missing persons, or vehicles involved in felony crimes. The now antiquated equipment used for this enforcement is being replaced with Flock Safety LPR.

The new license plate readers were first installed Nov. 1, 2022. Since then, Fairfax County Police say that its officers have used the license plate readers to recover 30 stolen vehicles, six firearms, assist in 50 arrests and help locate four missing people. 

In the incidents involving the four missing people, officers used their training and knowledge of LPR systems to help locate the people who were entered as missing persons in the National Crime Information Center. In three of the four cases, officers received an automatic alert when the person drove past a license plate reader. Officers responded to the area and began searching for the involved vehicle. The officers successfully located the missing persons and reunited them with their family.

In the afternoon of March 7, officers were initially searching for a critically missing adult who left the area on foot; however, use of the license plate reader camera gave officers vital information that led them to believe the missing person got on a nearby bus.

An elderly community member walked away from her residence in Reston and could not be located. Officers began searching the area. They found a witness who saw the missing person standing near a bus stop. Officers utilized the LPR system located nearby to search for buses that passed by the area at the time the missing was seen at the bus stop. A supervisor assigned to the Reston Police District recognized a bus number that led them to the bus driver who gave information to the whereabouts of the woman. She was found just moments later.

On March 16, officers from the Fair Oaks Police District and the Major Crimes Bureau teamed up to help locate an elderly woman who drove away from her home and was missing for many hours. Detectives determined the vehicle the missing person was driving and entered the license plate into the LPR system. While still investigating the whereabouts of the woman hours into the night, an alert was received from a stationary LPR device and officers responded to the area. A patrol officer stopped the vehicle and was able to safely reunite the missing woman with her family.

The FCPD reports that it  has chosen not to get alerts for violations regarding immigration status and that it does not share information to federal authorities regarding their investigations into immigration enforcement. The pictures collected by the cameras are stored on a cloud server for thirty days before they are permanently deleted and during that time they cannot be shared outside of law enforcement, FCPD says.

But civil liberties advocates say that license plate readers are an overreach of authority and threaten residents’ privacy.

Fairfax County Police have collected tens of thousands of license plates belonging to people who are not suspected of committing any crimes, but who are simply going about their day-to-day lives, says the ACLU of Virginia. This private data is stored and accessible by police, indexed by license plate number.

“Security and privacy can both be protected without giving police the unregulated power to collect private information ‘just because’ and ‘just in case,’” said Claire Gastañaga, former executive director for the ACLU of Virginia. “Where we go and when is personal. Use of ALPRs and other surveillance technology without a warrant or even the active intent to identify a particular person suspected of a crime means that police can track people who are going to protests, medical clinics and houses of worship, and this personal information sits in a database … whether you’re suspected of a crime or not.”