Motorola Solutions ALPR
Motorola Solutions · ALPR Camera
Staff Reviewed · 2026-09-28 — a person at DeSpy reviewed this rating. Reviewer's note: Verified
Index
Motorola Solutions sells automated license plate reader (ALPR) cameras — fixed on poles and mounted on patrol cars — that photograph passing vehicles, read the plate, record make, model and colour, and stamp each sighting with a location and time. The images flow into hosted databases (Vigilant LEARN, PlateSearch, VehicleManager) that police agencies search and share with each other. Motorola bought this business on 7 January 2019 for $445 million when it acquired VaaS International Holdings, whose subsidiaries were Vigilant Solutions (law enforcement) and Digital Recognition Network or DRN (commercial); EFF documents that DRN builds its dataset through partnerships with repossession companies and that police can buy subscription access to it. Nobody consents to being scanned: the California State Auditor found that 99.9 percent of the 320 million images the LAPD stores are of vehicles that were not on a hot list, and that audited agencies were sharing images with hundreds — Sacramento with over a thousand — of other entities across the country. EFF's analysis of that audit identifies Vigilant as the cloud provider behind the audited agencies and counts 230 California agencies deploying ALPRs. Motorola's published privacy statement does not cover any of this: it expressly excludes data the company handles in its capacity as a processor, so the drivers being photographed have no policy granting them notice, access or deletion, and the US LPR product page links no notice for them. The system has also leaked. In January 2025, 404 Media reported that researchers found roughly 170 Motorola ReaperHD cameras streaming unencrypted video and plate data onto the open internet. In November 2025, 404 Media reported that an ICE app letting officers scan a plate and pull up a vehicle's nationwide location history is powered by Motorola Solutions and Thomson Reuters.
Why this rating
The written explanation of this rating is withheld while a person re-reviews it.
What it is
- Camera
- GPS / location
- Requires a cloud account
- Manufacturer
- Motorola Solutions
- Category
- ALPR Camera
- Model years
- 2019-present under Motorola ownership (Vigilant/DRN products predate the acquisition; Motorola states the ReaperHD mobil
- Market status
- Current
- Companion app
- Agency-facing platforms: Vigilant LEARN, Vigilant PlateSearch, Vigilant VehicleManager (hosted web). 404 Media reports that ICE's "Mobile Companion" field app is powered by Motorola Solutions together
The evidence 12
Independent research, regulatory action, lawsuits and journalism about how this device handles personal data — the "what actually happens" axis. Each links to its source.
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The statement covers personal data Motorola handles as a controller for its websites and its business and government customer relationships, and explicitly 'does not cover or address how personal data may be processed in connection with the products and services we operate in our capacity as a processor' — the capacity in which ALPR scans are handled. It concedes that disclosure of contact, commercial, usage and inference data to ad networks and advertising partners 'may qualify as the sale of personal data'; authorises disclosure 'to comply with laws or to respond to lawful requests and legal process; to protect the rights and property of us, our agents, customers, and others'; contemplates retention 'until the statutory limitation periods have expired (usually three years, but up to thirty years in some cases)'; lists 'Precise geolocation data' among sensitive categories; and permits amendment by changing the date and, for material changes, 'prominent posting on our website'.
Why it matters here: Primary basis for the POLICY axis; establishes that the surveilled public is outside the policy's scope entirely
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The product page states that 'The data from Motorola Solutions' LPR systems is controlled and managed by the customer. The customer also manages access, data retention and can even decide how the data is shared', and invites customers to 'Set your own retention rules according to policy and manage data sharing on your own terms' — publishing no vendor-side retention ceiling or sharing limit. VehicleManager search lets a user 'Narrow results by make, model, color, accessories and even unique vehicle features like damage or bumper stickers.' No privacy notice or contact route for scanned drivers is linked anywhere on the page.
Why it matters here: Sole vendor source for the retention/sharing and vehicle-attribute-search deductions; also establishes the absence of any driver-facing notice
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Announces the acquisition of VaaS International Holdings for '$445 million in a combination of cash and equity' on 7 January 2019. VaaS subsidiaries are identified as Vigilant Solutions, serving 'law enforcement users', and Digital Recognition Network (DRN), serving 'commercial customers'. The release describes fixed and mobile license plate reader cameras driven by machine learning; it does not describe how DRN collects its data or to whom it sells.
Why it matters here: Vendor's own confirmation that Motorola owns both the police-facing and the commercial plate-data businesses
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ICE's 'Mobile Companion' app lets officers scan a licence plate and instantly see a vehicle's sightings across the country from a database of billions of records, and supports 'predicting where a car may travel in the future.' The capability 'is powered by both Motorola Solutions and Thomson Reuters, the massive data broker and media conglomerate.' Plate data is combined with driver licence data, credit header data, marriage records, vehicle ownership and voter registrations, and the app can also collect face scans for facial recognition.
Why it matters here: Directly names Motorola Solutions (not merely Vigilant) as powering a federal immigration-enforcement tracking capability
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Security researcher Matt Brown (Brown Fine Security) found Motorola ReaperHD ALPR cameras streaming unencrypted to the open internet; roughly 170 such streams were located, exposing colour and infrared video, licence plate numbers, vehicle make, model and colour, and timestamped location data. Will Freeman of the DeFlock mapping project wrote a proof-of-concept script that scraped the feeds into a spreadsheet, enabling real-time tracking of arbitrary people. Motorola Solutions responded that the ReaperHD is 'a legacy device, sales of which were discontinued in June 2022', that the findings 'do not pose a risk to customers using their devices in accordance with our recommended configurations', and that a firmware update would introduce 'additional security hardening.'
Why it matters here: Proves real-world exposure of live surveillance data from Motorola-branded hardware, with an on-record vendor response
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Statutory audit of Fresno Police Department, Los Angeles Police Department, Marin County Sheriff's Office and Sacramento County Sheriff's Office. Found that '99.9 percent of the 320 million images Los Angeles stores are for vehicles that were not on a hot list.' Retention varied widely: Fresno one year, Sacramento and Marin two years, Los Angeles at least five years. On sharing: 'Fresno and Marin have each arranged to share their ALPR images with hundreds of entities and Sacramento with over a thousand entities across the United States.'
Why it matters here: Government audit quantifying the untargeted nature of ALPR capture, retention sprawl and mass inter-agency sharing
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EFF's analysis of the audit reports that 230 agencies in California were deploying ALPRs, 'with the majority using Vigilant Solutions to collect, store, and analyze the data', and that the three agencies storing ALPR data in Vigilant's cloud — Fresno, Marin and Sacramento — 'do not have sufficient data security safeguards in their contracts.' It documents insufficient access controls, minimal audit oversight and excessive retention across the audited agencies.
Why it matters here: Ties the state audit's findings specifically to Motorola's Vigilant product rather than to ALPRs generally
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EFF documents that 'Vigilant Solutions, through its sister company Digital Recognition Network, offers access to data it has privately collected through partnerships with repossession companies', and that 'law enforcement can also purchase access to this commercial data on a subscription basis'. One vendor dataset is described as including 'more than 6.5 billion scans' and growing 'at a rate of 120-million data points each month'. Retention 'varies from agency to agency, from as short as mere days to as long as several years, although some entities—including private companies—may retain the data indefinitely.' No mechanism is described by which a driver can opt out or request deletion.
Why it matters here: Independent confirmation of the DRN commercial-brokerage structure that Motorola acquired, and of the absence of any driver opt-out
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Vigilant publicly asserted that 'These law enforcement agencies do not have the ability in Vigilant Solutions' system to electronically copy this data or share this data with other persons or agencies, such as ICE.' Records showed the opposite: within hours of an ICE official emailing a La Habra police detective, the detective returned a PDF from Vigilant's LEARN software containing the requested scans, including data originating from Fashion Island mall security. EFF further documents that Vigilant's agreements with agencies include non-disparagement and non-publication clauses binding them to the vendor's 'media messaging', and that Vigilant training materials recommended police omit ALPR references from official reports where possible.
Why it matters here: Establishes that this vendor's public assurances about data sharing have been demonstrably false, and that contracts suppress agency candour
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On 3 October 2025 the California Attorney General sued the City of El Cajon in San Diego County Superior Court for sharing ALPR data with 27 out-of-state law enforcement agencies across 26 states in violation of SB 34, the 2015 law barring sharing of ALPR data with federal and out-of-state agencies. A 2023 DOJ bulletin had already advised agencies that 'public agency' does not include out-of-state or federal bodies. The office cited risks of the data being misused to track immigrants, people travelling to California for reproductive care, and protesters. This action targets the agency operating the cameras, not the vendor supplying them.
Why it matters here: Regulator enforcement proving unlawful out-of-state ALPR sharing is an actual practice, not merely an allegation — though the defendant is a city, not Motorola
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S3Class Action Lawsuit Claims Motorola Solutions License Plate Readers Violate California Privacy Laws
A proposed class action, Rojas et al. v. Motorola Solutions, Inc. (no. 2026-CH-05072), filed 27 May 2026, alleges Motorola 'has violated California law by allowing its automatic license plate reader (ALPR) systems to share identifiable vehicle and location data with the federal government and out-of-state agencies without notice or drivers' consent.' It states that 'The UC Merced Police Department had been sharing ALPR data with several federal agencies, including Customs and Border Patrol, IRS Criminal Investigation, and the United States Secret Service', and contends Motorola 'does not maintain a legally sufficient privacy policy.' The complaint also references a January 2025 report that real-time footage and data from Motorola ALPR cameras could be viewed online without any login. These are allegations that have not been adjudicated.
Why it matters here: Current, unadjudicated litigation alleging exactly the federal/out-of-state sharing and missing public privacy policy identified on the policy axis
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Reports that the class action against Motorola Solutions over its ALPR cameras was filed in Cook County Circuit Court on 27 May by named plaintiffs Michelle Rojas and Marissa Barriga, both residents of Merced, California, who are represented by Scott Drury of Drury Legal in Highwood and Joshua D. Arisohn. The plaintiffs drove daily past Motorola-operated ALPR cameras near the entrance to UC Merced.
Why it matters here: Supplies the court, plaintiff and counsel details for the Rojas action, which the ClassAction.org write-up does not state
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