Police Treat Mass Surveillance as Entertainment, EFF Analysis Reveals Absurd ALPR Search Logs

On May 7, 2025, a Goshen Police Department officer queried 6,474 automated license plate reader networks representing 82,413 cameras. The documented reason for accessing this vast surveillance infrastructure: "idk"—internet slang for "I don't know."

This incident exemplifies a broader pattern uncovered by the Electronic Frontier Foundation. An analysis of search logs from Flock Safety ALPR systems reveals officers nationwide entering frivolous justifications to access sensitive driver location data. Police have logged reasons including "LOL" (laugh out loud), "LMAO" (laughing my ass off), "sexy," and random keyboard characters—all to search databases that track the movements of ordinary citizens.

When pitching ALPR technology to municipal governments, law enforcement and private vendors like Flock Safety, Motorola Solutions, and Axon emphasize its value for solving serious crimes: carjacking, kidnapping, murder. The reality documented in audit logs tells a different story. Officers routinely access these systems without legitimate justification, transforming mass surveillance infrastructure into what amounts to a personal search engine for tracking everyday drivers.

Flock Safety has introduced a dropdown menu system requiring officers to select from predefined crime categories before searching. However, this mechanism creates an illusion of accountability. The system does not verify that the selected category matches the actual purpose of the search, allowing improper queries to hide behind the appearance of legitimacy.

The absence of warrant requirements, minimal guardrails, and inadequate audit processes has enabled a culture where police treat location databases as unrestricted tools. This environment permits tracking of citizens for minor infractions, personal vendettas, and apparently, entertainment.

A Pattern of Documented Misuse

ALPR abuse is not new. Over the past year, documented cases have shown officers using these systems to stalk romantic partners, monitor protests that chill First Amendment activity, and even attempt to track women seeking abortion services. Police agencies typically maintain "network audits"—spreadsheets recording all searches conducted through their systems. Even small agencies log millions of searches from thousands of external law enforcement agencies across the country.

The EFF has also documented systemic ethnic profiling, with more than 80 law enforcement agencies using terms like "roma" and "g*psy" to target Romani people without mentioning any suspected crime. Beyond stalking and profiling, officers routinely deploy ALPRs for trivial investigations: confirming school zone residency, conducting employment background checks, responding to noise complaints, or targeting motorcyclists for holding cell phones.

The Absurdity of Search Justifications

Surveillance as Entertainment

• Barberton Police Department (Ohio) officers conducted numerous searches between March 2024 and May 2026 listing "LOL" or "lol" as justification.
• Harris County Sheriff's Office (Texas) employees ran multiple searches between April and May 2026 with "LOL" or "lol" as the case number.
• Lake County Sheriff's Department (Indiana) officers searched in July 2025 using "LMAO" as the reason.
• Richmond Police Department (California) conducted multiple searches in November 2024 for "Hehe."
• Riverside County Sheriff's Department (California) ran searches in 2024 for "Haha."

Indifference and Negligence

• Kankakee County Sheriff's Office (Illinois) employees conducted searches from 2023 to 2025 using "idk" or "idk lol."
• Goshen Police Department (Indiana) ran searches from May to June 2025 with "idk" as the reason.
• Fishers Police Department (Indiana) officers searched in May 2025 entering "blah."
• A Pasco Police Department (Washington) employee searched at least four license plates, leaving "robbery i don't remember the case number leave me alone" in the reason field.
• San Diego Sheriff's Department (California) conducted searches in May 2025 with "idk" as the documented reason.
• More than 30 agencies ran over 6,300 searches with "TBD" (To Be Determined) as justification, including the Arizona Department of Public Safety, Manteca Police Department (California), and Baton Rouge Police Department (Louisiana). Priceville Police Department (Alabama) alone conducted 1,954 searches with "TBD" as the reason.

Insults and Inappropriate Entries

• Belton Police Department (Missouri) ran searches from August to September 2024 using "d*ckhead."
• A Manteca Police Department (Illinois) employee conducted searches in June 2024 entering "sh*thead."
• A Norton Police Department (Massachusetts) officer searched in December 2024 for "Sexy."
• Corona Police Department (California) employees ran searches from 2023 to 2025 using "weird" or "WEIRD KID."
• Thornton Police Department (Colorado) officers conducted multiple searches in October 2025 for "driving around being weird."
• A Columbus Police Department (Ohio) officer ran searches in 2023 for "idiot."
• A Michigan City Police Department (Indiana) officer conducted searches in June 2025 listing "f*ck this new search engine."

Keyboard Mashing

Network audit data reveals numerous searches where officers appear to have simply pressed random keys. These entries consist of nonsensical character strings from adjacent keyboard areas:

• An Eatonton Police Department (Georgia) employee conducted searches with reasons including HJKNUILH, uiokjk.kuj, GJLHBNMN, hjhbnmg, and iuohjk.
• An Atlanta Police Department (Georgia) employee ran searches with "asdfga" as the reason.
• Bay County Sheriff's Office (Florida) employees conducted searches with reasons such as ;'lkjh, /lkjh, and lkjhg.
• A Brown County Sheriff's Office (Wisconsin) employee ran searches with reasons including gyghkkghghjkghjk, ggyjgyujdsrdghdfhjkghjghk, HJHJKLHLKHJK, hjjkjkhjkljk, and JHLJKHHJKL.
• A Lake County Sheriff's Office (Ohio) employee conducted searches with "asdfg" and "ghjkl," while another officer's searches began with "investigation" before devolving into button mashing.
• A Moore Police Department (Oklahoma) ran searches with reasons such as jhjhjkhj, jhjkhjh, jhjkhjkh, jkhhkjhjk, Jkhjkhj, Jkhjkhjk, Jkhjkhjkh, jkhjkhkjh, jkjkhjkh, kjjkhjk, loiuiou, ukjhjkh, and ulkuiou.
• A Westlake Police Department (Ohio) employee conducted searches with reasons including fghjkl, ghjkl, and lkjhg.
• A Kentucky State Police employee ran searches with reasons such as mhghjk, mhgnhjkj, nbvcxcvbn, nmbvcbnm, and sdfghj.

These character combinations bear no resemblance to legitimate police codes. The pattern suggests officers are circumventing accountability mechanisms they know lack meaningful oversight, particularly when accessing Flock Safety applications from mobile devices while driving.

How Departments Responded

When confronted with evidence of flagrantly inappropriate searches, police departments offered varying degrees of deflection and justification.

Thornton Police Department (Colorado) stated that the system did not require officers to select from a defined list at the time of the "driving around being weird" searches, but does now. The department claimed an audit determined all such searches served "legitimate public safety purposes."

Other agencies provided the following responses:

• Richmond Police Department (California) stated officers involved in "Hehe" and "idk" searches were "counseled."
• Corona Police Department (California) noted employees who searched for "WEIRD KID" no longer work for the city, citing unrelated reasons.
• Columbus Police Department (Ohio) cited union contract restrictions limiting their Inspector General's jurisdiction to incidents within the previous 90 days, effectively shielding the officer who searched for "idiot" in 2023.
• Belton Police Department (Missouri) promised a "thorough investigation" of "d*ckhead" searches through existing union and personnel policies.
• Manteno Police Department (Illinois) stated it will "review the searches and the circumstances surrounding them thoroughly" and "take whatever action is determined to be appropriate based on the facts and circumstances."
• Fishers Police Department (Indiana) explained the detective who entered "blah" does so "when he has issues with the technology" and uses the term "when he is actively using the technology to solve a criminal case, and the technology is not moving fast enough for him." The department said the officer has been instructed to use "test" in the future.
• Cobb County Police Department (Georgia) acknowledged "TBD" stands for "To Be Determined" and is no longer acceptable. The agency instituted a new policy requiring a criminal offense, reason, and case number for any search.
• San Diego County Sheriff's Department stated it verified cases where "idk" appeared and found "there was an active investigation associated with the searches." The department attributed this to the reason field being optional at the time, though California law has required documented purposes since 2015. The sheriff's office says the reason field is now mandatory with a dropdown menu.

Regarding Manteca Police Department (California), the spokesperson stated: "Since the beginning of 2026, our personnel have been directed that the reason field for ALPR searches must identify the law enforcement purpose for the search and that 'TBD' is not an acceptable entry." The spokesperson added: "The presence of 'TBD' in the reason field in prior searches should not, by itself, be interpreted to mean that the associated search was conducted without a legitimate law enforcement purpose or that reasonable suspicion was required." The EFF has requested clarification on whether the agency verified the hundreds of "TBD" searches were legitimate.

Multiple agencies did not respond to EFF requests for comment.

The Dropdown Menu as Accountability Theater

In late 2025, Flock Safety announced it would replace required free-text search justifications with a dropdown menu of generic offense categories. Officers can now select pre-packaged options like "Traffic infraction" or "Other" in seconds, eliminating the need to articulate why they are accessing driver movement history.

This change undermines transparency and accountability while appearing to streamline operations. Notably, audit logs containing the types of searches documented in this analysis have significantly decreased since early 2026.

Privacy as the Punchline

Entries like these erode transparency, eliminate accountability, and fail to satisfy what many jurisdictions require by law or policy: an actual documented reason for accessing sensitive data. This pattern persists because police leverage ALPRs to circumvent constitutional privacy protections.

In other contexts, such as accessing cell phone location information, law enforcement must petition a judge, demonstrate probable cause, and obtain a search warrant. ALPR technology has outpaced legal frameworks, however. Courts and legislatures have not imposed equivalent requirements on ALPR searches, leaving officers free to track movements without any judicial oversight.

A police chief requesting city council approval to install hundreds of cameras to investigate "haha" would be dismissed. A judge would reject a warrant application to track someone for "LOL." Yet these searches occur routinely without scrutiny.

The fact that agencies failed to catch these searches—and that thousands of other agencies whose systems were queried also missed them—demonstrates agencies cannot be trusted to police themselves.

Mass surveillance is fundamentally incompatible with free society, particularly when those wielding access treat it as entertainment. The indiscriminate, continuous collection and retention of location data on every driver, regardless of suspicion, should not exist. The EFF urges courts and state legislatures to immediately impose strict, enforceable restrictions. At minimum, this requires rigid data deletion deadlines and ironclad warrant requirements.

If police seek power to track movements, they must convince a judge with evidence and probable cause. They cannot bypass the Constitution with a search for "haha."