I'm glad that Mr. Doctorow has turned the hyperbole dial up to 11."The use of the ANPR database to flag-up vehicles belonging to protesters has resulted in peaceful campaigners being repeatedly stopped and searched. "Repeatedly? Yet you can only cite one example of it happening in the article?"which stores information on car journeys for up to five years."More like "car with xxx numberplate passed y camera at z date / time". Not exactly a complete journey.I wonder if he realises that the vast majority of ANPR cameras actually exist on the police cars themselves, and get most of their use out of recording the numberplates of those going past, and those plates are immediately checked to see whether the car has valid tax/insurance/MOT. If not, they can go and pull it over and ask why (a perfectly reasonable use, IMO). What I have a problem with is the seemingly arbitrary length of time the data is kept for. Why does it have to be 5 years? Also, do any markers placed on the car go away when the car is sold or transferred to someone else?