Letter to NYC Council Speaker Corey Johnson on the Passage of the POST Act

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NYC Council Speaker Corey Johnson City Hall Office
New York, NY 10007
via U.S. Mail and Email

Re: Passage of POST Act, Int. No. 0487-2018.

Dear Speaker Johnson,

We, the undersigned civil rights and community-based organizations, write to urge you to support passage of The Public Oversight of Surveillance Technology (“POST”) Act – Int. No. 0487-2018.

The POST Act addresses the long-unmet need for civilian oversight of NYPD surveillance practices, particularly the acquisition and deployment of novel, highly-invasive technologies. For years, the NYPD has built up an arsenal of spy tools on the public tab while trying to block public notice and debate. These tools not only include the so-called “gang database,” but also items like facial recognition, IMSI catchers (so-called “stingrays”), and automated license plate readers that can monitor a vehicle’s location throughout the city.

These tools pose a privacy threat to all New Yorkers, but they pose a particularly potent threat to our immigrant communities and New Yorkers of color. Unchecked, the growing use of surveillance technology threatens to obscure and automate racial inequalities under the guise of unbiased computer systems. And too often, these systems create a risk of information sharing with federal agencies, including Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (“ICE”).

For example, the NYPD has contracted for years with the private firm Vigilant Solutions, which 1
operates a national database of over 5 billion license plate data points. Shockingly, in recent years, we learned that Vigilant Solutions was not just contracting with local police departments, it was also 2
contracting with ICE. This is the vendor that the NYPD uses to record countless New Yorkers’ license plates per day, and we do not have an accurate understanding of how the NYPD may be. 3 Even worse, the NYPD relies on Vigilant Solutions’ artificial intelligence to map out social networks, label New Yorkers as “criminal associates,” and create databases based on the company’s unproven algorithms. 4 This is just one example of countless surveillance tools that require a systematic solution.

The POST Act is not just a comprehensive response, but also a modest one. The NYPD can continue using these tools by complying with limited protections against waste, discrimination, and misuse. In fact, the POST Act would be one of the most limited surveillance reform bills in the country, 5 especially when viewed in comparison to San Francisco’s 6 and Oakland’s 7 oversight legislations, which also contain outright bans on facial recognition technology or to Massachusetts’s state-wide moratorium on facial recognition. 8 Additionally, many of the jurisdictions require legislators to approve each and every surveillance system their municipality buys, unlike the POST Act, which only requires public notice.

The measure is not just widely supported by your City Council colleagues, it’s even endorsed by the 9
New York Times. The message is clear: civilian oversight of surveillance enhances the public’s trust 10
in police departments and public safety. Now, with twenty-seven city council members and the Public Advocate signed on as POST Act cosponsors, the time is long overdue for a hearing before the Public Safety Committee and a vote of the full City Council.

As the leader of the Council, you’ve constantly acted as a champion for communities in need. We urge you to do so once again and join this growing, national movement. With your support, we know the POST Act can be enacted before the end of the year. We look forward to your reply and assistance.

Cc: Chair Donovan Richards

Sincerely,

  1. A New PATH

  2. ACLU

  3. African Communities Together

  4. AI Now Institute

  5. Albuquerque Center for Peace and Justice

  6. American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee

  7. Arab American Institute

  8. Asian American Federation

  9. Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund (AALDEF)

  10. Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law

  11. Brooklyn College - Policing and Social Justice Project

  12. Brooklyn Community Bail Fund

  13. Brooklyn Defender Services

  14. Center for Human Rights and Privacy

  15. College and Community Fellowship

  16. Color Of Change

  17. Columbia Journal of History

  18. Constitutional Alliance

  19. Council on American-Islamic Relations New York Chapter

  20. Cryptoparty Ann Arbor

  21. Data Law Society, Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law

  22. Defending Rights & Dissent

  23. Demand Progress

  24. Dignity and Power Now

  25. DRUM- Desis Rising Up and Moving

  26. Empire State Indivisible

  27. Families for Freedom/ Familias por la Libertad

  28. Families Rally for Emancipation and Empowerment

  29. Fight for the Future

  30. Free Press Action

  31. Hacking//Hustling

  32. Immigrant Defense Project

  33. Inner-City Muslim Action Network

  34. Jewish Voice for Peace-New York City

  35. JustLeadershipUSA

  36. Legal Aid Society of NYC

  37. Lucy Parsons Labs

  38. Martinez Street Women's Center

  39. Media Alliance

  40. MediaJustice

  41. Million Hoodies Movement for Justice

  42. MinKwon Center for Community Action

  43. mother’s against wrongful convictions

  44. NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc.

  45. National Lawyers Guild - NYC Chapter

  46. Nevius Legal

  47. New York Civil Liberties Union

  48. New York Communities for Change

  49. New York Immigration Coalition

  50. Northern New Jersey Jewish Voice for Peace

  51. NYC Privacy Board Advocates

  52. Oakland Privacy

  53. PDX Privacy

  54. Restore the Fourth

  55. Revolutionary Love Project

  56. Rhode Island Rights

  57. S.T.O.P. - The Surveillance Technology Oversight Project

  58. Secure Justice

  59. TAKE ON HATE - NY

  60. Temple Beth El

  61. Tenth Amendment Center

  62. The Bronx Freedom Fund

  63. The Calyx Institute

  64. The Cypurr Collective

  65. The Interfaith Center of New York

  66. The National Action Network

  67. Urban Justice Center

  68. Urban Justice Center Mental Health Project

  69. WITNESS

  70. X-Lab

1. See Rocco Parascondola, Exclusive: NYPD will be able to track fugitives who drive past license plate readers across the U.S., N.Y. Daily News, Mar. 02, 2015, https://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/nypd-track-fugitives- drive-license-plate-readers-article-1.2133879.

2. Russell Brandom, “Exclusive: ICE is about to start tracking license plates across the US,” The Verge, January 26, 2018, https://www.theverge.com/2018/1/26/16932350/ice-immigration-customs-license-plate-recognition-contract- vigilant-solutions.

3. See Mariko Hirose, Documents Uncover NYPD’s Vast License Plate Reader Database, ACLU, Jan. 25, 2016, https://www.aclu.org/blog/privacy-technology/location-tracking/documents-uncover-nypds-vast-license-plate- reader-database.

4. See id.

5. See ACLU, Community Control Over Police Surveillance, https://www.aclu.org/issues/privacytechnology/surveillance-technologies/community-control-over-police- surveillance.

6. See Kate Conger, San Francisco Bans Facial Recognition Technology, N.Y. TIMES, May 14, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/14/us/facial-recognition-ban-san-francisco.html

7. Sarah Ravani, Oakland bans use of facial recognition technology, citing bias concerns, San Francisco Chronicle, July 17, 2019, https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/Oakland-bans-use-of-facial-recognition-14101253.php

8. See Editorial Board, San Francisco Banned Facial Recognition. New York Isn’t Even Close. N.Y. Times, May 18, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/18/opinion/nypd-post-act-surveillance.html.

9. See Massachusetts Senate, Bill S.1385, https://malegislature.gov/Bills/191/S1385.

10. Oakland, California and Seattle, Washington have enacted similar police oversight laws without deteriorating public safety. See id.

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