Your 4th Amendment Rights
The Fourth Amendment protects you from unreasonable government searches. Courts and legal scholars are actively debating whether mass license plate scanning qualifies as one. South Carolina's own constitution may offer even stronger protections than federal law.
Carpenter v. United States (2018)
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that police need a warrant to access long-term cell phone location data. The Court recognized that tracking someone's movements over time reveals deeply personal details - where they worship, who they visit, what doctors they see. Legal scholars argue that ALPR networks raise the same concern: they record where every car goes, every day, without a warrant.
The mosaic theory
A single license plate scan might seem harmless. But when cameras log every trip you take - to church, to a doctor's office, to a political rally, to a friend's house - the full picture reveals your private life in detail. Courts are increasingly recognizing that this kind of aggregate tracking is qualitatively different from a single observation. What matters is the full picture, not any one tile.
Institute for Justice v. City of Norfolk
The Institute for Justice, a public interest law firm with strong conservative and libertarian support, is currently challenging ALPR surveillance in federal court. Their Plate Privacy Project argues that mass plate scanning without suspicion violates the Fourth Amendment. This is not a left-right issue - IJ frames it as a property rights and constitutional question.
SC Constitution, Article I, Section 10
South Carolina's constitution goes further than the federal Fourth Amendment. It protects against both 'unreasonable searches and seizures' and 'unreasonable invasions of privacy.' The SC Supreme Court has applied this privacy clause to require law enforcement to have reasonable suspicion before even approaching a private residence - a higher bar than federal courts set. If state courts require suspicion before a police officer knocks on your door, it is worth asking what legal basis exists for cameras that log every passing car without any suspicion at all.
This section is for informational purposes only and is not legal advice. It summarizes what courts and legal scholars are currently debating. If you have questions about your legal rights, consult a licensed attorney.
How Other States Compare
At least six states have passed laws restricting how license plate data is collected, stored, and shared. South Carolina has none.
SC Bill Tracker
Last updated: March 2026
What's Missing from the Pending Bills
H4675 closes some of these gaps. The other three bills don't.
No restrictions on federal agency access
Three of the four pending SC bills (S447, H3155, H4013) regulate state and local law enforcement but say nothing about federal agencies. H4675 is the exception: it explicitly prohibits immigration enforcement use of ALPR data and bans third-party cloud storage, which would structurally prevent federal agencies from accessing the data through Flock's network. In 2025, Flock Safety quietly gave U.S. Border Patrol an account to access local police cameras in Colorado without telling any of those agencies. SC has no law that would prevent the same arrangement here, unless H4675 passes.
No prohibition on immigration enforcement use
Illinois law explicitly bans using ALPR data for immigration enforcement. When local agencies violated that ban by sharing data with CBP, it led to contract cancellations. H4675 is the only SC bill that includes a similar prohibition, banning immigration enforcement use outright. The other three bills (S447, H3155, H4013) don't touch it. Under current SC law, federal immigration agents can access your travel data with no legal barrier.
No limits on Flock's national data-sharing network
Your local city council approved cameras for local crime-solving. But Flock operates a national network that lets hundreds of outside agencies, including ones your council never heard of, query location data collected on your streets. H4675 would ban third-party cloud storage entirely, which would structurally break this network in SC. The other three bills don't address it at all.
No disclosure requirements for vendor data agreements
Flock Safety rewrote its Terms of Service twice in three months (December 2025 and February 2026), making 147 documented changes. Key changes included deleting data ownership language and granting itself a perpetual license to use customer data. If a city's contract auto-incorporates updated terms from Flock's website, the city may already be bound by provisions it never agreed to - and no SC law requires the vendor to notify anyone.
No penalties with teeth for data misuse
Three of the four bills include misdemeanor penalties, but enforcement depends on catching violations in the first place. H4675 goes further: it requires quarterly independent audits by the SC Inspector General and gives residents a private right of action to sue for violations. The other three bills rely on agency self-reporting. When the Post and Courier asked SLED for records of recent ALPR database misconduct, SLED refused to produce any documents. A 2013 case showed a law enforcement officer with SLED database access searched for his own vehicle and altered the record.
No regulation of feature expansion after deployment
Flock has bolted on person-tracking technology, convoy analysis, visit frequency tracking, and voice detection since its initial license plate reader product. Its Raven microphone system, marketed for gunshot detection, now listens for human voices. H4675 bans AI-based vehicle tracking beyond license plates, which would block some of these features. But none of the four bills address post-deployment feature additions broadly, meaning your police department could still activate new surveillance capabilities without council approval or public notice.