Tracking Our Cars Now

According to a study published by the ACLU, law enforcement agencies across the country are scanning images of parked and moving vehicles, noting their location and then uploading the information into police databases. The data is stored for an indefinite amount of time.  Although a judge's approval is needed to track a car with GPS, according to the Supreme Court, scanning license plates, even a few times a day, to track location is permitted. As this scanning becomes more utilized by law enforcement, it becomes "easier to build a record of where someone has been and when..."

Law enforcement says it is an investigative tool to be used when looking for information on a particular vehicle in connection to a crime, and not intended to follow the public's movements. However, from a study done by the ACLU: "based on 26,000 pages of responses from 293 police departments and state agencies across the country, found that license plate scanners produced a small fraction of “hits,” or alerts to police that a suspicious vehicle had been found. In Maryland, for example, the state reported reading about 29 million plates between January and May of last year. Of that number, about 60,000 – or roughly 1 in every 500 license plates – were suspicious. The main offenses: a suspended or revoked registration, or a violation of the state’s emissions inspection program, altogether accounting for 97 percent of alerts."

"Although less thorough than GPS tracking, plate readers can produce some of the same information, the group says, revealing whether someone is frequenting a bar, joining a protest, getting medical or mental help, being unfaithful to a spouse and much more."

Seems the cost of security is getting higher, only we're paying with our liberties.
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/07/17/you-can-drive-but-you-cant-hide-millions-of-innocent-american-drivers-are-being-tracked/
http://news.yahoo.com/driving-somewhere-theres-govt-record-140052644.html