'Constant eyes': Toronto police’s new AI plate readers explained

Our Take

Credit to CBC News Toronto for calling this what it is: constant eyes. Toronto police are pitching AI-powered cameras that read plates, makes, and models as a crime-fighting tool, but the pitch always sounds the same no matter which side of the border you're on. It's the same sales script Flock Safety runs in American city council meetings every week — frame it as narrow and targeted, then quietly let the network grow until it's tracking everyone's daily movements, not just the handful of actual suspects.

This matters to us even though it's a Canadian department, because the surveillance infrastructure being normalized in Toronto is functionally identical to what's spreading across U.S. towns right now: AI-assisted ALPR cameras that build a searchable record of where your car has been, indefinitely, without a warrant. Once that kind of database exists, the conversation about 'who gets access' and 'how long is it kept' always comes after deployment, never before. Departments rarely volunteer to roll it back once it's in place.

If you want to see how far this has already spread in American neighborhoods, check our camera map, and if you'd rather not wait for a camera to show up on your street before asking questions, our take-action page has steps for pushing back at the local level.