Cameras at about 70 intersections across Denver snapped millions of photos of cars’ license plates and flagged suspected stolen vehicles to police in 2024.
The eight-month pilot program resulted in law enforcement recovering about 170 cars and arresting nearly 300 people. It helped solve homicides, robberies and hit-and-runs, according to the Denver Police Department.
But as the City Council prepares to decide whether to extend the program for another two years, the surveillance gear is raising privacy concerns and questions about whether federal agents could obtain the data for activities like deportations.
Here’s how the cameras work: When a car passes through an intersection with a camera, it takes a photo of the license plate and what the vehicle looks like. The system then cross-references the license plate with national and local law enforcement databases. If a plate matches one listed in the system as stolen or involved with a crime, the Denver Police Department is notified — with a pinpoint of where the photo was taken — within about 15 seconds.
“It’s just a concern that we’re creating some serious potential for unintended consequences by using the tech,” Councilwoman Sarah Parady said during a Safety, Housing, Education and Homelessness Committee meeting last week.
The Denver Police Department says the company, Flock, only stores the photos for 30 days unless they are flagged as part of an investigation. Flock also doesn’t have contracts to work with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security or U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
“For anyone to access our DPD data… they have to sign and attest that they won’t give the information to ICE or use it for civil violations related to that,” Denver police Cmdr. Jacob Herrera said.
The two-year extension of the 111 cameras deployed throughout Denver would add $666,000 to the contract, bringing the total program cost to about $1 million.
Car thefts have gone down in Denver since the pilot program began. In 2023, more than 12,000 cars were stolen in the city. In 2024, there were about 8,500 car thefts, according to Denver police data. Herrera attributes that decrease to multiple initiatives, including the cameras.
During the committee meeting, Councilwoman Serena Gonzales-Gutierrez raised questions about whether DPD tracks when the system makes mistakes. Detroit recently paid $35,000 to settle a lawsuit alleging a woman and her child were wrongly detained as a result of the Detroit Police Department’s use of license-plate readers.
Herrera said Denver police don’t have a formal system for tracking false positives, but that the department makes sure officers know the technology isn’t foolproof.
“We communicate very strongly to the officers… You still need to be an observer, an investigator, before you pull this car over or take action. This is just a probability, it’s not a certainty,” he said.
The system takes photos of about 2 million cars every month on average, Herrera said. The photos are limited to the vehicles themselves and don’t include drivers or passengers.
Councilman Kevin Flynn asked during the meeting whether the system could be challenged as a violation of the Fourth Amendment, which protects people from unreasonable searches and seizures.
“This system doesn’t have any of those features that have caused either the United States or the Colorado Supreme Court to say there have been constitutional violations,” said Matthew Kirsch with the Denver District Attorney’s Office.
The Safety, Housing, Education and Homelessness Committee forwarded the proposal to the full council, which is scheduled to vote on the measure April 14.
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