The Department of Homeland Security wants to tap into already existing plate databases from private businesses (Finance and repo companies) and law enforcement agencies. The goal is to have an ever evolving database full vast amounts of information on US citizens.

According to the Washington Post article, the database could easily contain more than 1 billion records and could be shared with other law enforcement agencies, raising concerns that the movements of ordinary citizens who are under no criminal suspicion could be scrutinized.

A spokeswoman for DHS’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE) stressed that the database “could only be accessed in conjunction with ongoing criminal investigations or to locate wanted individuals.”

The database would enhance agents’ and officers’ ability to locate suspects who could pose a threat to public safety and would reduce the time required to conduct surveillance, ICE spokeswoman Gillian Christensen said.

The key word that sticks out for me here is - 'could' - who makes that determination? I am not alone with my concerns. “Ultimately, you’re creating a national database of location information,” said Jennifer Lynch, a staff attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation. “When all that data is compiled and aggregated, you can track somebody as they’re going through their life.”

ICE issued a notice last week seeking bids from companies to compile the database from a variety of sources, including law ­enforcement agencies and car-repossession services.

Agents would be able to use a smartphone to snap pictures of license plates that could be compared against a “hot list” of plates in the database. They would have 24-hour, seven-day-a-week access, according to the solicitation.