From the namecheap link:

There's plenty of other low-cost embedded systems that use Linux.

Here's what one person said about it:
 

Someone is new to open source/designs I see. Arduino has a bazillion knockoffs that are compatible yet they still seem to be doing okay. Unless RPi isn't an open architecture - in which case, why do we advocate its use?

You can likely do some of that, though some of what you describe (following specific people) would fall under anti-stalking laws. As noted elsewhere in this thread, repo companies are already doing this and businesses have cameras set up on their property and within the store recording your every move. Get writing! You only need a bunch of people willing to do this and a lot of license plate reading equipment.

Seems reasonable to me.

The supreme court and EFF disagree with you. While you have the right to travel freely, you have no right of privacy when in public and collecting information about you and your travels does not impede you traveling. You also have the option of not traveling by your own car - you can rent a car, borrow one from a friend, walk, bike, or take public transit.

As for your last statement I completely agree that collected data should be deleted after some period of time - enough time that if it's needed as evidence it can be used, but not so long that your entire travel history is available for perusal at any time by any person.

What constitutional right? Privacy? Let's see what the EFF says about that:

https://ssd.eff.org/your-compu...

That means the police can follow you around in public and observe your activities, see what you are carrying or to whom you are talking, sit next to you or behind you and listen to your conversations — all without a warrant.

Again, fine. So long as it's not considered a public record.

I'd be fine with that result. So long as we don't start thinking that these kinds of videos are public records that can be searched without a court order.

Why?

I mean, from a privacy sense, you're in a public place and therefore have no reasonable sense of privacy. Do you chase down people that are taking photographs where you or your car are in the background?

If you want to talk about what's done with that data after it's been collected that's a different story and not what is being asked for in this case. But you're just as entitled to set up your own license plate tracking system just like the police are.

Also think of this as a lead in to having police carry cameras and record every interaction with the public. Should that data get dumped immediately if the person is not accused of a crime? Michael Brown was accused of a crime, but there wasn't time for Wilson to know that, so under your rules, the events leading up to his shooting would be expunged.

But you cared enough to reply. I'm touched.

What if there were an ongoing crime and results were dumped before it was known that data was needed? What constitutes a "hit list"?

Methodology is different from what is collected. Methodology is "every police vehicle has a model ZRX-9000 plate scanner which is always in operation with results sent in real time to a central server where the data is held for 30 days unless a court orders it to be held longer as part of an ongoing investigation/trial". We should absolutely have that information. But just like I don't need to see your tax records, I don't need to see where you've been for the past week.

Fine, have an independent oversight board review the records without making them public while keeping the details secret.

"What are you collecting" is different from "What did you collect" and "What privacy should be applied to what is collected".

EFF/ACLU is asking for B which is the wrong question. A and C are far more important without knowing exactly what is collected.

Here's a scenario:

You're interviewing for a new job. You drive to the company to interview on site. While you're on your way, the police tag your car in various spots along your trip including the parking lot of the site. Now under normal circumstances, that data would be private and not released without court order (yes, fantasy land, but bear with me) so your trip remains private and after some period of time those records are expunged.

Now say that the EFF and ACLU get their way and have all that data released. All your movements are now considered public record available for review by anyone. Do you want your boss pouring through your movements?

Information about the collection techniques (what gets captured, how long are they held, when and how are they destroyed, etc.) is fine. The actual videos themselves may contain enough information to track vehicles over a period of time. We don't really like it when cops do it, why should we let everyone else have this data?

I don't necessarily like knowing cops have this information but so long as there's rules over the collection (see above) I'm okay with this. If the EFF and ACLU (whom I normally support) wants the actual data, they can get their own OCR license plate cameras and drive around.