RCW 10.130

Washington’s plate reader statute was signed on 30 March 2026 and took effect immediately under its emergency clause, becoming chapter 10.130 of the Revised Code of Washington.^[3] It is the strictest statute of its kind on this site.

The default rule is a prohibition. “Except as provided for in this section, it is unlawful for any agency to access, operate, or use an automated license plate reader system or its associated automated license plate reader data”, and “agency” reaches every state and local agency, counties included.^[1] The permitted uses are enumerated: law enforcement comparisons against specific hotlists, plates an officer determines relevant to a stolen vehicle, a missing or endangered person, a felony or gross misdemeanor warrant or offense, plus parking and traffic uses.^[1] A positive match “alone does not constitute reasonable suspicion as grounds” for a stop.^[1]

Data not tied to an authorized purpose “shall not be retained longer than 21 days”, the shortest retention cap on this site.^[1] Use for “immigration investigation or enforcement” is unlawful, and collection is barred at or immediately around protected health care facilities, schools, places of worship, courts and food banks.^[1] Vendors “must default any settings related to sharing to prevent any sharing”, and privately held plate data can be obtained only with a probable-cause warrant.^[1]

Two duties make this chapter a research instrument. First, every agency using or intending to use a system had to register it with the state Attorney General within 180 days of the effective date, and “agencies may not use automated license plate reader systems that have not been properly registered”.^[1] That registration list is a statewide inventory that a single records request can reach. Second, beginning 1 December 2027, each agency must publish an annual report on its own public website, including the locations of its cameras, total reads, searches that yielded results, alerts, and the identity of every governmental entity its data “was shared with or accessed by”.^[1] Agencies must also conduct an internal audit at least once each year, over audit trails the chapter requires them to keep for two years.^[1]

One caution for records requests: the chapter provides that plate reader data itself “is not subject to disclosure under the public records act”, so requests aim at the policies, the registration, the audits and the reports rather than the reads.^[1] Like Oregon’s SB 1516 and California’s SB 34, the statute governs how systems run; whether a network should exist at all remains a local decision, taken by the bodies whose records these county pages document.