{"id":18991,"date":"2026-10-06T12:19:56","date_gmt":"2026-10-06T19:19:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/?p=18991"},"modified":"2026-10-06T12:19:56","modified_gmt":"2026-10-06T19:19:56","slug":"how-a-us-federal-drug-program-built-a-national-surveillance-network","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/2026\/10\/06\/how-a-us-federal-drug-program-built-a-national-surveillance-network\/","title":{"rendered":"How a US Federal Drug Program Built a National Surveillance Network"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I was always sure the federal government was hoovering up all the ALPR camera data, and this confirms one mechanism. And the federal government is paying for it, and the interesting part is they’re gobbling up the data from not just Flock, but all the other ALPR systems as well. And the data is being uploaded to other servers escaping the manufacturer’s servers. This pretty much proves this is a federal surveillance system with a much more expanded scope, and definitely is a violation of our fourth amendment protections. And the data is being stored for much longer periods than what a local municipality might give lip service to. It’s rather diabolical, and to be expected from the federal government.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

https:\/\/reclaimthenet.org\/how-a-us-federal-drug-program-built-a-national-surveillance-network<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n

<\/div><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n
The constitutional question changes once a city\u2019s modest camera network joins everyone else\u2019s.<\/h5>\n\n\n\n
\"A<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

By Ken Macon<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The way things are done in the US means that nobody ever decided to build a national record of where all cars have been, but nobody ever refused either. Instead, the system was assembled from a grant program, a state road rule, and a form. It’s easy to dismiss the story of Brunswick, Georgia, as just another obscure local government meeting and a largely ignored agenda item \u2013 but, at a time where everyone is paying close attention to cameras that track their vehicle\u2019s movements, it reveals a lot when looked at closely.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The city council’s September 2-16 packet runs to dozens of pages, with the relevant information hiding on page 2 and page 36. The first reveals that the city is considering an agreement with the Georgia Department of Transportation HIDTA (High-Intensity Drug Trafficking Area), while the second spells out the reason: if the city wants to have Axon plate cameras on state rights-of-way, it must share the data.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The agreement, which the city police and attorney recommended, is to share data for investigative purposes, and at HIDTA’s request. The document doesn’t say if the council accepted the proposal, and the scan is of poor quality, resisting text extraction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It’s clear that the data that would be shared is not only from license plate readers, but also “aggregated information collected from multiple individual or regional sources” and put into “commercially available and custom developed data integration systems.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Local police are making the footage available to HIDTA, which is a multi-jurisdictional task force, and the data is then shared with other agencies, federal, state, and local, 404 Media is reporting<\/a>. The site obtained this information from public records and court documents, and many of the documents were accessed by Cris van Pelt, who publishes Flock Safety audit logs<\/a> on his site.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The program is a grant, and in order to get the money, local police must agree to share data with HIDTA. 404 Media said that this data then ends up on federal servers, and is available to other agencies, including those that do not have contracts with the companies that make the cameras.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Note that the company’s page for Georgia agencies<\/a> spells it out: if you install or operate cameras on a state right-of-way, you must sign an agreement to share the data, if you haven’t already.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Flock’s page for Georgia agencies states that the rule applies only to cameras located in the Georgia Department of Transportation (GDOT) right-of-way. And if a city or a county has cameras there, they must allow Flock to share the data with the High-Intensity Drug Trafficking Area (HIDTA) National License Plate Reader (LPR) system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Flock’s page also states what the federal interface that it provides to HIDTA “users” returns: “the number of matching results in Flock’s database, the time of the most recent match, and the owning agency’s name (when applicable).”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Flock adds that “Flock LPR reads, their location, and associated vehicle images are not available through this interface.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

404 Media, which reported this, quoted Flock’s page as saying something different \u2013 that the interface would let HIDTA system users access “LPR reads from GDOT ROW cameras.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That sentence is no longer on the page. There is no archived version available to show when the change occurred.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It would be easy, but also wrong, to dismiss the platform as a perversion of the 1988 law.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1988<\/a> created the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP), also known as the drug czar’s office.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

HIDTA is a grant program, and its authorizing statute is 21 U.S.C. 1706(d)<\/a>. The purpose of the program, according to the ONDCP’s own FY 2027 budget submission<\/a>, “is to reduce drug trafficking and drug production in the United States.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The budget then spells out how this is to be done, in four points. The points are worth reading closely because they speak about the means, and the means is what the program has turned out to be all about.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Firstly, the purpose is to be achieved by “facilitating cooperation among federal, state, local, and Tribal law enforcement agencies to share information and implement coordinated enforcement activities.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Secondly, by “enhancing law enforcement intelligence sharing among federal, state, local, and Tribal law enforcement agencies.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thirdly, by “providing reliable law enforcement intelligence to law enforcement agencies needed to design effective enforcement strategies and operations.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lastly, by “supporting coordinated law enforcement strategies which maximize the use of available resources to reduce the supply of illegal drugs in designated areas and in the United States as a whole.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The purpose is drugs. But the means is sharing. And when the purpose is weak, the means – which is the part that actually gets built and developed, and in this case, integrated into one platform – takes over.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In other words, the platform is not a perversion of the law – it is the law read plainly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The budget submission describes the local governance of the program: “At the local level, each HIDTA is directed and guided by an Executive Board composed, in most cases, of an equal number of regional federal and non-federal (state, local, and tribal) law enforcement leaders.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The document calls the discretion that the Executive Boards have in spending the money a “central feature” of the program: “A central feature of the HIDTA Program is the discretion granted to the Executive Boards to design and implement initiatives that confront the specific drug trafficking threats in each HIDTA region.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The way to make such a massive operation efficient is to have a template that can be applied anywhere, and have all the actors involved follow it. That would explain why the agreements that various levels of law enforcement sign with each other and with private companies contain almost identical wording.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Atlanta-Carolinas HIDTA has its own agreement, dated January 31, 2023, that its platform, the AC-HIDTA LPR Database System, will \u201ccontinually work to expand the connectivity of the AC-HIDTA LPR Database and will actively pursue opportunities to sign MOU agreements with new public agencies and other information sharing systems.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Georgia version, called the HIDTA License Plate Reader Integration Platform (HLPRIP), has wording that is almost identical: \u201cwill continually work to expand the connectivity of the HLPRIP Database and will actively pursue opportunities to sign MOU agreements with new public agencies and other information sharing systems.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What is promised in the agreements, in their own words, is growth. And it\u2019s not just about adding more cameras, but also about developing the system to be able to harvest data from the ones that are already in place, and are operated by different companies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The data collected by the system are images of cars, with the time and place of the “encounter” attached to each. This is what is stored, and shared.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Georgia version of the document says that data will be stored for two years by default, but that agencies can request that it be kept for longer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Regarding retention of data, the document states that all LPR system data provided to the AC-HIDTA will be stored on the Operations Center server for a period not to exceed two years, or as per state law. Data that is deemed evidentiary may be kept for longer, but only with a written request.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The data that is collected includes images with timestamps, lane of travel, and transaction data.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Georgia document is not the only one of its kind, and others may set different rules. For example, the Atlanta-Carolinas HIDTA has a policy that says LPR data will be purged at the three-year mark, on a weekly basis. And while the Georgia document states that data can be kept longer if an agency requests it, the Atlanta-Carolinas HIDTA policy says that this can be done by submitting a request in writing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A limit on data retention that can be extended on request is not a limit at all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The hub-and-spoke model of surveillance, as it is known, is designed to dissolve the boundaries between vendors and make the brand of a camera irrelevant – as long as it is connected to the hub.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One such hub was created by the Houston HIDTA (High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area) \u2013 a regional division of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP). The HIDTA paid a contractor $306,800 to make this possible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The contractor, Recruitful LLC, was given the job of creating and maintaining an LPR database, that would be a search tool for data collected by cameras made by Flock, Axon, ELSAG and Vigilant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The statement of work for this project spoke about combining “third party” data into one database, and described the database as one that would “migrate” or duplicate data from local entities into the centralized database.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

All this was done so well that the White House decided to give the Houston HIDTA an award for it in April. The award, HIDTA of the Year<\/a>, praised the agency for “managing an automated license plate reader platform that brings together all levels of law enforcement.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The strongest case to be made for the controversial HIDTA program is the government\u2019s own \u2013 and it\u2019s one of impressive drug seizures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The White House says that last year, the 33 High Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas (HIDTAs) \u201cseized 1,885,908 kg of illicit drugs and 71 million illicit pills.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The administration also claims that this resulted in denying \u201cdrug traffickers $21.6 billion in illicit profits.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The White House further asserts that \u201cFor every dollar invested in the HIDTA Program, the American people get $82.78 in benefits.\u201d And that the program is \u201can effective and efficient use of taxpayers\u2019 money.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The DEA has been very clear and direct in stating the privacy problem with its National License Plate Reader Program (NLPRP): it is that the system may allow for the tracking of an individual\u2019s travels thanks to the high number of cameras involved \u2013 and that it collects data on law-abiding drivers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The DEA wrote this in its own privacy impact assessment<\/a>, published in December 2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The document shows that the agency is aware that the system \u201cmay incorporate such large numbers of other governmental LPR network cameras and\/or may acquire commercial LPR cameras system data in a large enough quantity in the future to effectively permit on-going tracking of individual\u2019s travels posing a risk to individual privacy.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another risk is that the DEA \u201crisks an over-collection of the personally identifiable information of every license plate passing each LPR camera location, including a large number of images of travel of law-abiding drivers not relevant to criminal investigations,\u201d the assessment said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The DEA operates its own plate readers, and also gets access to \u201cnon-DEA equipment\u201d through the High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area (HIDTA) program and other \u201ccontributing law enforcement agencies.\u201d The DEA said that these agencies \u201ctransmit their LPR data to servers maintained by regional hubs pursuant to their individual MOUs, which stipulate that this data may be shared with the NLPRP system.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The DEA is also working to integrate its system with a Customs and Border Protection (CBP) plate camera system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meanwhile, the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) has been working on policy recommendations for the use of automated license plate readers (ALPRs) in counter-drug investigations, the office\u2019s FY 2027 budget submission reveals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The work was done with the MITRE corporation, HIDTAs, the DEA, and other law enforcement partners. The budget describes it as analyzing \u201cthe operational and policy implications of ALPR technology, culminating in a final report to guide its effective and appropriate use.\u201d The report is not publicly available.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The way the HIDTA program is structured and the way it functions means that nobody is really in charge, and nobody is really accountable \u2013 and that is not an accidental byproduct of the scheme, but the very way it was designed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The DEA has argued that HIDTAs are not subject to public records laws because they are governed by an executive board of state, local, and federal law enforcement. And when local agencies receive requests for records, they either point to the feds, or claim the data is stored on “the Federal Houston-HIDTA database.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The DEA, in a filing in a case brought by a man who wanted to obtain HIDTA records about himself, said that HIDTAs are not subject to the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) because they are not an entity at all, but merely a grant program made up of law enforcement members.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The filing continued: “Since DEA has no custody or control of HIDTA records, no HIDTA records responsive to Plaintiff’s request exist within DEA.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The arrangement is such that HIDTAs sign memoranda of understanding with local agencies, while some of these agencies, like the Randolph County Sheriff’s Office in North Carolina, say “all data is kept on the Federal Houston-HIDTA database.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

HIDTAs are said to be similar to, but separate from, government fusion centers. Both are used by law enforcement to share information and intelligence, but HIDTAs are more focused on drug trafficking.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This office has done something like this before.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The White House Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) has funded a series of law enforcement and overarching surveillance programs, including one that collected phone records and location data on more than a trillion AT&T calls<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

EPIC’s Jeramie Scott put it this way: “The White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, which notoriously funded a centralized call record database that exceeded a trillion records that was used by HIDTA participants, has apparently done a similar thing for license plate reader data.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The government has in the past gone to great lengths to keep the Hemisphere Project<\/a> out of the public eye, and Scott said he wouldn’t be surprised if they had tried to keep this new program secret as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe whole scheme adds another layer of obfuscation of how license plate reader data is being used and who is using it,\u201d Scott is quoted as saying.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Fourth Amendment case brought against a network of 176 cameras in Norfolk, Virginia, was recently decided by a federal court<\/a> \u2013 in part because the system\u2019s limited scope was found to be not in violation of the Constitution. But that premise is precisely what is destroyed when data from various, seemingly limited networks is aggregated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That means, a court that weighs the constitutionality of a local network might be looking at the wrong thing. US District Judge Mark Davis<\/a>, who ruled in the Norfolk case, wrote that the question was whether the city had crossed the line into unconstitutional surveillance, and that \u201cat least in Norfolk, Virginia, the answer is: not today.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meanwhile in Kansas, a man has sued the city of Wichita over its network of nearly 200 cameras<\/a>, also arguing that it is unconstitutional.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mason Grimmett, a machinist from Wichita, is being represented by the Kansas Justice Institute<\/a>, a public interest law firm, that has sued in Sedgwick County District Court, alleging that the system violates Sections 15 and 20 of the Kansas Constitution Bill of Rights.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Senator Josh Hawley is preparing to introduce a new bill, the Stop Flock Abuse Act<\/a>, that would regulate the use of automated license plate readers (ALPRs) \u2013 but not ban them. Its provisions, such as allowing data to be kept for 10 days and then only deleted if there is no criminal investigation, would still enable the creation of a national driving history record.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Reps. Thomas Massie and Eric Burlison have introduced the Flock-Off Act<\/a>, H.R.10221<\/a>, which would cut off federal funding for both license plate readers and biometric cameras, with some exceptions, such as using the cameras for toll collection, or within a mile of the northern and southern US borders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The money runs one way and then appears to stop. ONDCP\u2019s budget records HIDTA enacted at $290,000,000 in FY 2022, $296,600,000 in FY 2023, $302,000,000 in FY 2024, $298,579,000 in FY 2025, the same in FY 2026 \u2013 and then, $0 in FY 2027.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The zero is not a cut. The budget explains it: \u201cFor FY 2027, the Budget proposes to transfer the HIDTA program to the Department of Justice.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In July, the White House announced<\/a> \u201ca historic $277 million for the High Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas (HIDTA) Program\u201d \u2013 and called it \u201cthe largest investment in the HIDTA Program\u2019s history.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to the announcement, the program \u201cis designed to dismantle drug trafficking organizations and seize deadly drugs like illicit fentanyl.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

ONDCP Director (Drug Czar) Sara Carter was quoted as saying, \u201cPresident Trump\u2019s bold action against the drug cartels is saving American lives. This funding will strengthen the HIDTA Program\u2019s relentless crusade against illicit drugs.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now the budget is looking to transfer the program<\/a> to the Department of Justice, which is where the DEA is, and the DEA runs the National License Plate Reader Program.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A decision never taken cannot be reversed by taking it back.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So what’s to be done? The money could be cut. The courts could be used. Or the form of the program could be refused.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I was always sure the federal government was hoovering up all the ALPR camera data, and this confirms one mechanism. And the federal government is paying for it, and the interesting part is they’re gobbling up the data from not just Flock, but all the other ALPR systems as well. And the data is being […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18991","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-tech","category-world"],"blocksy_meta":{"styles_descriptor":{"styles":{"desktop":"","tablet":"","mobile":""},"google_fonts":[],"version":8}},"featured_image_src":null,"author_info":{"display_name":"Jason","author_link":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/author\/jturning\/"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18991","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18991"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18991\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18992,"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18991\/revisions\/18992"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18991"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18991"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18991"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}