California Fines Data Broker That Required Your SSN to Opt Out

Our Take

Credit to Verified Privacy VPN for digging into the CalPrivacy decision against LocateSmarter, a data broker that allegedly made you hand over the last four digits of your Social Security number just to exercise your legal right to opt out of having your data sold. That's not a privacy protection, that's a gatekeeping tactic dressed up as one. If the bar for stopping the sale of your data is higher than the bar for selling it in the first place, the system is broken by design.

This matters to us because the same logic runs straight through the ALPR and Flock Safety ecosystem. Data brokers, plate-reading networks, and the companies that quietly share location data all count on friction, confusion, and bureaucratic hostility to keep people from asserting whatever rights they do have. A $116,490 fine is a rounding error for an industry that trades in bulk personal data, but it's a rare public admission that these companies know exactly what they're doing when they bury opt-outs in demands for sensitive information.

If you're trying to understand how your movements and data get swept up by networks like this, check out our camera map to see what's watching in your area, and head to our take-action page if you want to push back on the surveillance creeping into your own community.