This article first appeared in inewsource. Sign up for their newsletters here.
Dozens of covert cameras are scattered across southern San Diego and Imperial counties, tucked into orange construction barrels and two-wheeled trailers on the sides of well-traveled interstates and highways. Who owns them is just as hidden.
These cameras are automated license plate readers. It’s a technology used widely by police departments to collect data on drivers who pass into their view, tying their license plates to a time, date, location and perhaps a crime.
But these particular cameras, disguised along the region’s major roadways, do not appear to be operated by local law enforcement. They may instead be owned and operated by the federal government, according to research and public records requests compiled by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a San Francisco-based privacy and civil rights advocacy organization.
EFF mapped just over 40 hidden license plate readers in Southern California. It says there are indications they could belong to U.S. Customs and Border Protection, which includes the Border Patrol, as well as the Drug Enforcement Administration, but EFF hasn’t yet determined definitively who owns each one.
With the initial findings from a public records request filed in June — and news of the former Border Patrol commander who oversaw the Minneapolis immigration crackdown returning to California — EFF sent a letter to the governor and the head of Caltrans pushing for action.
“California must not allow Border Patrol and other federal agencies to use surveillance on our roadways to unleash violence and intimidation on San Diego and Imperial Valley residents,” EFF wrote in the letter, signed by Imperial Valley Equity & Justice, Alliance San Diego, the American Civil Liberties Union in California and more than two dozen other groups.
California law prevents local authorities from sharing license plate data out of state or with federal agencies, but federally owned license plate readers may be a loophole around such data-sharing restrictions.
In San Diego County, the license plate readers are placed mostly in rural, mountainous areas. In Imperial County, they are along freeways connecting the vast agricultural region.
Inewsource sent questions to CBP and the California Department of Transportation. Neither agency answered those questions before publication.
In response to questions from inewsource, a spokesperson for the DEA said the agency “does not publicly discuss its investigative tools and techniques.”
Proponents say license plate readers help law enforcement more quickly identify and locate people they accuse of serious crimes. Detractors say the technology indiscriminately collects information on drivers — their daily routines, travel routes and associates — and can be abused.
Local law enforcement’s use of license plate readers have become a focal point in debates in so-called “sanctuary” communities, including San Diego, that seek to protect immigrants because of the data’s potential to be used for immigration purposes if shared with federal authorities.
California state law prevents such sharing, as well as out-of-state license plate sharing, though the El Cajon Police Department is challenging the law in court. The state attorney general sued the city in October, alleging officials there jeopardized residents’ safety by sharing sensitive location data with police departments across the country.
Dave Maass, EFF’s director of investigations, said federally operated readers installed on state rights of way would be a “back door” around the state’s data-sharing restriction.
Documents released by Caltrans show that CBP and the DEA have applied for permits to place or conduct maintenance on license plate readers along checkpoints, highways and interstates managed by Caltrans over the years. At least one license plate reader physically identified by EFF coincides with a permit applied for by the DEA in 2016.
Maass is waiting on additional Caltrans records to determine whether more of the license plate readers EFF has mapped are operated by the federal government.
In the letter sent last week, EFF and the other groups urged Gov. Gavin Newsom and Caltrans Director Dina El-Tawansy to revoke any permits issued to CBP and the DEA for license plate readers and to “effectuate their removal.”
Maass, who has researched surveillance tech in the region for years as an investigative reporter and then with EFF since 2013, said the covert readers seen in California follow similar patterns of those in Arizona, which were identified through permitting records as owned by the federal government. Those license plate readers use the same type of disguises — construction barrels and trailers — as the ones seen in California.
Sergio Ojeda, an organizer with Imperial Valley Equity & Justice, said it was a “big shock” when he learned about the presence of license plate readers in his community. Now, he says, it’s always on his mind when he’s driving.
“Whenever I am going around, either for my personal duties or for work, I just feel seen all the time,” Ojeda said. “It’s very uncomfortable.”
Federal immigration agencies received a budget supercharge last year with the passage of Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which includes about $2.7 billion set aside exclusively for border surveillance technologies. New purchases could include more license plate readers.
A recent investigation by the Associated Press detailed a Border Patrol network of license plate readers from California to Texas along the Mexican border.
In November, the AP reported that the Border Patrol and the DEA operate license plate reader programs that track millions of motorists, including U.S. citizens. Intended to intercept people trafficking drugs and humans, the program uses “predictive intelligence” to alert authorities to drivers whose travel is deemed suspicious.
inewsource is a community-focused nonprofit, nonpartisan newsroom dedicated to investigative and accountability journalism.
