A California judge has ruled to end a decade-long surveillance program in Sacramento, wherein the city’s utility provider collaborated with law enforcement to access detailed smart-meter data on 650,000 residents in the search for cannabis cultivation. The court determined that the program constituted a breach of state privacy laws, which limit the sharing of residential electricity usage data. This ruling underscores broader concerns regarding the erosion of privacy rights and the potential for such programs to disproportionately affect certain communities.
The program, which spanned over a decade, involved the Sacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD) collaborating with the Sacramento Police Department and other agencies to sift through the energy consumption data of residents without suspicion in an attempt to identify possible cannabis cultivation sites. Legal advocates representing three petitioners, including the Asian American Liberation Network, argued that the initiative posed significant privacy risks, including the wrongful criminalization of innocent citizens and the creation of hostile encounters with law enforcement. The ruling emphasized that the mass surveillance program did not conform to traditional law enforcement practices, as it did not target specific crimes or suspects.
In its decision, the court ruled that the broader surveillance effort was not part of any formal law enforcement investigation. Investigations typically involve police pursuing specific crimes and identifying particular suspects. The court emphasized that the widespread collection of data from all 650,000 SMUD customers without concrete evidence of criminal activity constituted a breach of confidentiality obligations under California’s data privacy statutes. The ruling underscores the need for public utilities to ensure that they do not disclose customer data to law enforcement without a justified suspicion of a specific crime. Going forward, the court’s decision serves as a precedent for other utilities throughout California, emphasizing the importance of adhering to data privacy laws.