Overview
- The Chicago Police Department has opened a draft directive for public comment and launched an internal audit after narrowing officer access to outside automated license-plate reader systems to only those whose job duties require it.
- The draft would force officers to record a case number, offense type and a detailed reason for every external ALPR query and would make logins nontransferable, require monthly audits, and set out penalties for misuse.
- CPD proposes cutting its own ALPR data retention from 365 days to 30 days, but that shorter retention would apply only to city-owned cameras and not to private networks such as Flock.
- The department denied a records request about who can search the Flock network, calling it unduly burdensome after finding roughly 211,998 rows that would need review and redaction under state public-records law.
- The policy changes come as local prosecutions and suspensions over Flock searches, vendor-configuration problems and a reported Genetec app update that removed a frontline plate-search feature have increased political pressure and scrutiny of third-party networks.