Police Scotland have recorded 478,966,518 images of drivers in Scotland using ANPR cameras. Jake Hurfurt, head of research and investigations at Big Brother Watch said:
“These figures suggest Scottish drivers are some of the most spied on in the world.
“Millions of innocent people have their journey captured and saved by police and other systems as a matter of course, and this level of surveillance has no place in a democratic society.
“ANPR being a fact of everyday life – when it started out in a counter terror context – is a prime example of mission creep in an area dangerously lacking in regulation.
‘This shows why we need to fight to defend our privacy rights at every turn – otherwise we run the risk of quietly sliding toward a surveillance state.”