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As concern grows around federal immigration enforcement in the Trump era, the town of Atherton is sharing sensitive surveillance data with police departments that do not conform with California law and Atherton’s own policies.
The town has around 50 cameras from Atlanta-based surveillance company Flock Safety, including 30 privately funded cameras, that capture the license plates of passing cars. An estimated 45 million vehicles pass by the cameras annually, although the system only retains license plate numbers for 30 days.
While Atherton has used the license plates to investigate cases of stolen vehicles and burglaries, the town also allows 295 outside agencies to search its automated license plate data. Police agencies now have the ability to search a growing network of cameras across the state to track individuals — and federal authorities and immigration officials may be able to as well.
Through the California Public Records Act, this news organization obtained logs showing outside agencies conducted millions of searches of Atherton’s license plate reader network. While its policy requires the police commander to review every search request Atherton receives, it has not been followed since at least January. The policy also requires outside agencies to specify the reason for the request — something missing from thousands of requests.
While Atherton claims it does not share the license plate data with federal agencies, thousands of searches were done on behalf of federal authorities by partner agencies.
History
The town’s network of cameras came after months of deliberation over balancing the public safety benefits and residents’ right to privacy.
In response to a rash of burglaries in 2018 and 2019, Atherton bought its first fixed automated license plate readers to test at Holbrook Palmar Park. After the test, Atherton purchased 16 additional fixed license plate readers in May 2020.
At the time, some councilmembers were concerned about infringing on the privacy of residents.
“I worry a lot about the civil liberties side of this,” then-Councilmember Mike Lempres said. “You put these up and people’s reasonable expectation of privacy goes down.”
Lempres also said calling them just license plate readers was misleading as the cameras capture a still image including people’s faces and surrounding areas.
At other meetings, members of the Peninsula chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union also spoke against the cameras. In response to privacy concerns, Police Chief Steven McCulley pointed out Atherton’s strict policy that requires annual audits and requirements for sharing data.
McCulley also used Atherton’s policy to address concerns regarding sharing its data with outside agencies. While the ALPR policy was based on one from Lexipol, a company that provides template municipal policies, the council reviewed and edited the policy for several months to ease concerns of residents about unnecessary surveillance.
Now, the Atherton Police Department says its policy is unrealistic.
“When Atherton first implemented its ALPR program, we were among the early adopters in California. At the time, there was no large-scale network of shared ALPR cameras, and our policy was written with that limited scope in mind,” Atherton police Cmdr. Dan Larsen said in an email. “That said, we recognize that our written policy—particularly sections 469.8(a) and (b)—should be updated to reflect the operational realities of network sharing.”
“While the policy currently states that the commander or designee will review every external request, that provision was drafted before the automated network model was in place. Given the volume of searches that occur across the network, it is no longer feasible to manually approve each one, and we are in the process of updating our policy accordingly,” Larsen added.
From Jan. 1 to July 15, 2025, outside agencies searched Atherton’s ALPR database over 2.9 million times. With 11,300 people conducting those searches, the average user searched 40 times per month. Some users searched over 4,000 times per month.
Section 469.8(a) of the Atherton Police Department Policy Manual requires that any agency requesting to search its database provides the name of the agency, the name of the person making the request and the intended purpose of the request. Section 469.8(b) requires the commander approve every request.
Larsen also denied that its policy applies to outside agencies. “It’s important to note that Atherton’s ALPR policy governs only our agency’s use of the system and access to data. When other agencies search the network, they are responsible for ensuring compliance with their own policies and California law,” Larsen said.
State law, however, requires any agencies that share its ALPR data to “require that ALPR information only be used for the authorized purposes described in the usage and privacy policy” of the agency that runs the camera. Atherton is also required by law to collect the information mentioned in section 469.8(a) of its policy.
Outside agencies
Atherton’s data appears to be being searched on behalf of immigration enforcement and federal agencies.
In February, the Bakersfield Police Department searched Atherton’s and 758 other law enforcement agencies’ Flock ALPR systems 18 times with the reason of “HSI.”
Homeland Security Investigations, referred to as HSI, is a division of Immigration and Customs Enforcement. HSI investigates child exploitation, trafficking and smuggling of goods and people, transnational gangs and enforcing labor law involving undocumented and documented immigrants, among other things.
Bakersfield did not respond to requests for comment.
State law bars state and local agencies from working with federal authorities for immigration purposes, but that does not mean it never happens. Some sheriffs openly admit to being willing to violate state law for immigration enforcement purposes.
For example, according to Hearst television affiliate KCRA 3, Amador County Sheriff Gary Redman says he will proactively reach out to ICE for immigration enforcement when he believes the suspects are a danger to the public.
Atherton shares its ALPR data with the Amador Sheriff’s Office, which searched Atherton’s database 13 times this year so far. In all cases, it provided only a case number, not a reason.
The Anaheim Police Department searched Atherton’s ALPR database 14 times with the reason “ICE.” Anaheim Sgt. Matt Sutter told this news organization the searches were not on behalf of ICE, but were for an investigation related to the ICE protests in Anaheim.
The Newport Beach Police Department searched Atherton’s database four times with the reason of “CBP,” a common acronym for Customs and Border Patrol. The department received $170,000 from the Department of Homeland Security which it plans to use to purchase cameras and surveillance equipment in order to “raise the level of U.S. border and California coastline security amongst law enforcement agencies” as part of DHS’ Operation Stonegarden. Newport Beach did not respond to requests for comment.
Between Jan. 1 and July 15, 2025, Atherton’s ALPR network was searched 832 times for reasons that included HSI, ICE or CBP. While some searches cited non-immigration purposes, many did not. The network was also searched hundreds of times on behalf of federal agencies — both identified and unidentified — and for federal warrants.
None of these searches targeted Atherton specifically but were for thousands of cameras across the state.
When asked about some of these requests, Larsen said: “If you’ve identified specific requests with ‘ICE’ or ‘CBP’ as the stated purpose, please provide those examples. We will investigate and, if necessary, revoke access for any agency not in compliance with policy or law.”
This news organization provided several examples to both Larsen and McCulley. Neither have responded. Larsen is out of office until after The Almanac’s deadline.
Larsen also said Flock prevents searches containing key words including “ICE.”
Privacy
California is not the only state where Flock’s ALPR network may have been used for immigration enforcement in violation of state law.
404 Media previously reported that in Illinois, where there is a law that prevents local law enforcement from working with immigration enforcement, local agencies from around the country were searching a town’s Flock ALPR cameras on behalf of ICE and Homeland Security for immigration enforcement.
While ICE can’t directly search Flock’s database, departments would conduct a search on its behalf informally. Atherton is not part of the national database.
Agencies do not need a warrant nor any suspicion of a crime to conduct a search. One civil liberties organization is currently suing a Virginia city arguing surveillance using Flock without a warrant violates the fourth amendment, which protects against unreasonable search and seizure by a government agency.
By law, Atherton is required to mandate agencies provide a “purpose for accessing the information” when requesting to search its ALPR database. In June alone, Atherton allowed agencies to view its database 466 times even though their only provided reason was “crime.”
This news organization emailed Atherton Mayor Elizabeth Lewis and councilmembers Bill Widmer and Rick DeGolia about Atherton’s ALPR policy that they approved while on town council: none responded.
Not the only agency
The Atherton Police Department is not the only agency that operates ALPR cameras and shares its data with hundreds of departments across the state. The San Mateo County Sheriff’s Office, Menlo Park police and Redwood City police also use Flock to share data with many of the same agencies.
The Almanac has sent Public Records Act requests to the Redwood City and Menlo Park police departments and the San Mateo County Sheriff’s Office. Menlo Park says it is still processing the request, while this news organization is disputing Redwood City’s redactions that hide the reasons for searches. The Sheriff’s Office has failed to respond within the law’s required 10-day deadline.
I wish this were a surprise. But data has a way of getting used in ways one didn’t want to happen. That’s why privacy compromising systems like these MUST have default-restrictive policies that are ENFORCED.
When the police department itself starts violating the law because it’s ‘not feasible’ as APD Commander Larson states. Excuse me? This is not his choice. He has a duty to follow policy. He MAY bring it up for revision. But just ignoring it should have consequences. The Atherton council needs to make him testify at a minimum.
This is exactly the kind of creep that must be prevented by policies on this kind of data. Do NOT allow unqualified sharing of data. Do NOT allow searches without an audit of policy compliance. Do NOT share with any agency that will not agree to abide by OUR policies. The idea that we can’t control what happens under other department’s uses is exactly why access should be restricted.
This is a violation of trust and probably law. Our representatives need to follow up.
Note: I’m not a fan of ALPR systems, but I do understand their value in some circumstances. But to get that value, we should not allow creeping data and privacy violations. Do not say ‘then don’t do anything wrong’. That’s not how it works. Creeping usage is how this plays out badly for everyone. Homeland security decides they’re worried about you and start tracking without any good cause. Lawyers subpoena the data for a civil suit. And more.
1) Control access. If an agency cannot see fit to comply, cut them off. Period. If APD is unwilling to comply, turn off the system.
2) Enforce retention policies. I see no mention in the article about how they are doing on this. It is critical that personal location data is not kept beyond the statutory 30 day limit. Not by APD, not by Flock not by partner agencies. Do we know if this is happening?
Arden Margulis, keep up the good work and now do Menlo Park. MPPD had put up a LOT of ALPR systems in the last year. What’s happening there?
Excellent and important reporting. Keep it up. Our democracy is at stake.
In Menlo Oaks, I have also noticed these types of cameras set up on private property but facing the street. I believe they are used in connection with a private security service that some neighbors use. I have often wondered where the images and data are and if there are any privacy controls. If a police department that is subject to rules and public oversight is oversharing, what can we expect from a private security company?
Excellent article. For those of you concerned with the Minority Report level creep of digital surveillance, you could just move to East Palo Alto and completely avoid it and the law enforcement that comes with it. You could run stop signs, dump garbage, park nonfunctional vehicles and trailers on city streets, and shoot off fireworks whenever you want with no worries of law enforcement or your data being shared. So if that is something that you want, you could have it in spades here.
No one has an expectation of privacy when in public. “minority report” comparisons are just hyperbole. There are cameras everywhere monitoring public spaces and the owners of that data are free to do with it as they please. There shouldn’t be any restriction on law enforcement’s use of the data either. All that happens when you do that is you ham string their efforts to keep our cities safe.
This is not accurate. There is a California law that limits the use of data from these cameras. It appears that Atherton may not be compliant with the law. You should reread the article.
I understand it is the law. My point is, it shouldn’t be.
I am conservative and believe strongly in full enforcement of Constitutional protections but, technology ended any reasonable expectation of public privacy long ago. Public privacy is, at its face, oxymoronic. Technology highlights the discord. Enforcement of existing laws which purport protection of public privacy deliver, at best, a myth. If you’re doing nothing wrong, what are you really concerned about?
A comment on the state of mind of police in general, their motto to protect and serve a public that pays their wages notwithstanding …
“A truism in law enforcement is that officers do not rise to the moment but fall to the level of their training.”
Jamie Thompson, The Atlantic
March 2024
What every “moment” calls for, and what the taxpaying public has every right to expect from every single interaction with law enforcement, is adherence to the U.S. Constitution’s Bill of Rights, and the Fourth Amendment in particular!
It is not a violation of the bill of rights, nor the fourth amendment to collect photos, video or other data that is in the public space. That is long settled law.
And Jamie Thompson? Another member of the fourth estate that couldn’t get a story straight if you wrote it for her. Her opinion is noted.
Laws are subject to interpretation, to being broadly or narrowly construed.
The police, who are still answerable to the taxpaying public despite decades of stonewalling, should err on the side of a narrow interpretation, reserving broad for exceptional circumstances. But no. No, no, no. We have to make do with the sacred Thin Blue Line.
This license plate data issue, and deploying the no-privacy-in-public fig leaf, is laughable, and unsurprising.
The Atlantic doesn’t publish stories that aren’t credible. Officers do fall to that reference point when a situation could elicit some out-of-the-box thinking in ardent defense of a narrow interpretation of the Fourth Amendment. That would be admirable.
In a Venn diagram of the terms “police officer” and “using one’s imagination,” is there any overlap? Any at all?
“In a Venn diagram of the terms “police officer” and “using one’s imagination,” is there any overlap? Any at all?”
Don’t know any police officers do you? Yes, there is overlap.
Apologies for saying “laughable.” That was disrespectful and I’m sorry.
The defense of a consistently broad interpretation of the Fourth Amendment employed by police and their bedfellows is disappointing, not in keeping with the founder’s spirit, and toxic to our democracy.
Clevenger: you don’t actually know any police officers do you? The police don’t interpret the fourth amendment, the courts do. If the police cross the line that the courts have set they get slapped down. If you don’t like the “overly broad interpretation” of the fourth amendment your quarrel is with the courts, not the police.
I’ve “met” some officers, in Menlo Park.
I was accosted one night while walking with my rent check to my landlord’s home a few suburban blocks from my home. I was wearing a headlight, a bright-as-day reflecting vest and a blinking red light on my backpack.
Suddenly, an SUV pulled diagonally across my path. I thought it was a stupid driver but out came a police officer, from an unmarked vehicle, who did not identify himself, did not shine his flashlight on his badge or nameplate, did not move his right hand from atop his holstered gun, and proceeded to interrogate me, ungraciously and demanding, as to whether I was a trespasser.
He left me standing there with not a trace of an apology. His was the power. I, a citizen and taxpayer, was clearly subordinate in his mind. Absolutely disgusting and undemocratic.
About a week later, I was unloading my groceries from my bike, at home, in my driveway, wearing that same vest as well as headlights and taillights on my helmet and bike. It was more than obvious what I was doing, and yet a police officer in a marked SUV crawling by, its side-looking searchlight illuminating me and my bike and my home, took me for a suspected trespasser.
He apparently parked his SUV out of sight, emerged and demanded, at the top of his voice, “Do you live here?”
No “Pardon me, sir.” No introduction. A bright light on me but not himself as he walked on to my property.
I responded angrily with a “Yes I do.”
In both these incidents, tell me that these dumb****s ride to the occasion rather than falling to the level of their training, or rather below it!!!
I meant “rise” to the occasion, not ride.