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Iowa lawmakers advance bill to regulate automatic license plate readers amid privacy concerns
Lawmakers say the proposal adds privacy ‘guardrails’ to a growing surveillance tool, while preserving ALPR use in criminal investigations
Feb. 16, 2026 3:16 pm
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DES MOINES — A bill advancing at the Iowa Capitol would establish new guardrails on the use of automatic license plate readers, aiming to balance law enforcement’s investigative needs with heightened concerns about privacy and data sharing.
House File 2161 would require private ALPR operators to permanently delete all captured license plate images and associated data within 30 days. Law enforcement agencies would be allowed to copy and retain data relevant to active criminal investigations, with those records governed by existing evidence retention policies. Violations of the deletion requirement would be punishable as a simple misdemeanor.
The bill also would require counties or municipalities to adopt a local ordinance before ALPRs could be used. After 24 hours from when an image is captured, individuals could not access the image or related data unless a magistrate issues a search warrant for a specific license plate or vehicle, or a county attorney issues a subpoena. Limited exceptions would apply for emergencies, including Amber Alerts, human trafficking cases and situations involving lost or stolen vehicles.
Supporters of the bill in a subcommittee meeting Monday repeatedly emphasized that the goal is not to ban the technology but to ensure it is used responsibly.
“This bill constitutes a considerable improvement over current state law,” said Noah Bazis, a legislative strategist with the Institute for Justice — a libertarian-oriented public interest law firm. “It thoughtfully balances constitutional protections while giving law enforcement flexibility in exigent circumstances.”
Bazis warned that warrantless access to large databases of location data poses a threat to Fourth Amendment rights, citing a 2018 U.S. Supreme Court ruling, which recognized that people have a reasonable expectation of privacy in their movements over time.
ACLU warns of ‘dragnet surveillance of Iowans’
The American Civil Liberties Union of Iowa voiced strong support for the bill, pointing to the rapid expansion of ALPR use and new technological capabilities such as artificial intelligence.
“Community safety is a critical goal, but 24/7 dragnet surveillance of Iowans should not be a precondition for that safety,” said Becca Eastwood, representing the ACLU of Iowa.
She said the organization has advocated for ALPR oversight since 2014, but warned that today’s systems are far more robust and raise greater privacy concerns.
From the ACLU’s perspective, Eastwood said, three protections are essential: requiring warrants to access data, limiting how long data is retained and restricting data sharing. She raised particular concern about contracts between municipalities and private vendors that allow worldwide data sharing.
Eastwood cited contract language granting vendors an “irrevocable worldwide license” to use data generated by customers. She pointed to reports that Flock, the automatic license plate reader and AI-powered camera company, provided training materials to overseas workers in the Philippines to train its machine learning algorithms, telling workers how to review and categorize footage including images of people and vehicles in the United States.
Law enforcement groups also expressed support for the bill, while proposing amendments to clarify how the technology would be governed in practice.
Tony Phillips, representing the Iowa State Sheriffs’ & Deputies’ Association, said the organization worked with multiple agencies to draft amendment language that reinforces accountability while preserving ALPRs as an effective public safety tool.
“These systems need to be used responsibly and have clear guardrails,” Phillips said.
Proposed changes would require local approval and written policies before ALPRs could be used, mandate audit trails and case numbers for searches, prohibit facial recognition features and limit third-party data sharing. The amendments would also create criminal penalties for improper use of the systems.
“There should be accountability in these scenarios,” Phillips said. “People need to use these tools the right way.”
Lawmakers say bill provides needed guardrails to valuable law enforcement tool
Some law enforcement officials cautioned against overly restrictive data retention limits, arguing they could hinder investigations.
Greg Stallman, with the Altoona Police Department, described cases in which longer retention periods were critical to solving serious crimes, including a sexual assault investigation involving a juvenile victim who did not come forward for several weeks.
“ALPRs are a small part of investigative technology — not the only part,” Stallman said, emphasizing that investigators still rely on warrants and subpoenas as cases develop.
Stallman acknowledged the need for guardrails but argued many already exist through constitutional standards and federal criminal justice information-sharing rules.
“We’re not retaining data for the purposes of retaining data,” he said. “It’s investigatory.”
Christopher Rants, speaking on behalf of Flock Safety, said the company supports amendments proposed by law enforcement and welcomes statutory guardrails on data use.
“We believe there is a balance to be had,” Rants said. “We welcome guardrails around how data is used.”
Responding to lawmakers’ questions about data sharing, Rants said Flock does not sell ALPR data and that communities retain ownership of the information. He acknowledged limited AI training is used to identify new vehicle models but denied that data is broadly shared.
Several lawmakers stressed that the bill preserves local control. State Rep. David Young, R-Van Meter, said the legislation does not ban ALPRs, despite calls from some members of the public to do so.
“If that’s going to happen, it’s going to be by citizens of a county or municipality who go to their city council or board of supervisors,” Young said. “ … But we wanted to ensure that law enforcement has the tools that they need to do their job to keep our communities and families safe (and) at the same time, put some guardrails to protect our privacy in what we are seeing more and more as just a surveillance society.”
Rep. Megan Jones, R-Sioux Rapids, who chaired the subcommittee, echoed that sentiment as the committee Monday advanced the legislation to the full House Transportation Committee.
“These are tools for our law enforcement that we need at a time when we have a terrible time recruiting and retaining law enforcement in our communities,” Jones said, pointing to their use in locating missing children, addressing human trafficking and solving crimes. “This just gives them one more tool in their toolbox to be successful. But at the same time, I realize that we need to put some guardrails on these — so let's do that.”
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