17
camera at First Amendment activity, or zoom any activity. Also, there should be an even higher
“probable cause” standard for any automatic tracking or facial recognition.
78
Finally, Chicago operates a “fusion center” known as the Crime Prevention Information Center.
Its purpose is to gather, store, and share information about suspected criminal activity. In other
states, fusion centers have improperly gathered, stored, and shared information about lawful
groups and their political beliefs and activities.
79
The City should adopt a “reasonable suspicion”
standard for this fusion center, to avoid the kinds of abuses committed by fusion centers in other
states, and in the past by Chicago’s Red Squad. Unfortunately, the controlling Chicago policy
allows its fusion center to collect, disseminate, and store “suspicious activity reports” based on
“a level of suspicion that is less than ‘reasonable suspicion,’” namely, a mere “potential terrorism
nexus,” or activities only “consistent with” terrorism.
80
Notably, the Illinois State Police has
adopted a reasonable suspicion standard for its fusion center, and the Director of National
Intelligence has adopted that standard for its nationwide database of suspicious activity reports
from state and local police.
81
VII. Where do protests commonly occur in Chicago?
The public locations most commonly used for protest in Chicago are owned by different
government agencies, and thus have different rules and permit processes. They also enjoy
different levels of First Amendment protection, depending upon whether they are “traditional
public forums” entitled to the most protection, or other kinds of forums entitled to less
protection. Immediately below is a list of these locations, and a brief description of their level of
First Amendment protection, along with their owners, rules, and permit processes.
78
See generally ACLU of Illinois, “Chicago’s Video Surveillance Cameras: A pervasive and
unregulated threat to our privacy” (February 2011), at
http://il.aclu.org/site/DocServer/Surveillance_Camera_Report1.pdf?docID=3261.
79
ACLU of Maryland, Fusion Centers in Illinois, http://www.aclu-md.org/press_room/205;
http://www.aclu-il.org/fusion-centers-in-illinois/; T.J. Greaney, ‘Fusion center’ data draws fire
over assertions, Columbia Tribune, Mar. 14, 2009,
http://www.columbiatribune.com/news/2009/mar/14/fusion-center-data-draws-fire-over-
assertions/; ACLU, Fusion Center Declares Nation’s Oldest Universities Possible Terrorist
Threat, Apr. 6, 2009, http://www.aclu.org/technology-and-liberty/fusion-center-declares-nation-
s-oldest-universities-possible-terrorist-threat.
80
Chicago Police Dept.’s CPIC, “Privacy, civil rights, and civil liberties protection policy”
(approved in March 2011) at Parts E(1), F(2), F(3).
81
Illinois State Police, “Privacy Policy for the Statewide Terrorism and Intelligence Center”
(April 2010) at Articles V(A), V(B), V(C)(1), V(C)(4), V(G)(1), VI(B)(1)(a); Director of
National Intelligence, “Functional Standard for Suspicious Activity Reporting for the
Information Sharing Environment” (May 2009). See also 28 C.F.R. §§ 23.3(b)(3)(i), 23.20(a),
23.20(f)(1) (requiring reasonable suspicion for state and local criminal intelligence databases
funded by the federal government).