A field guide from the Tech Equity Coalition and ACLU of Washington maps downtown Seattle's surveillance infrastructure through a 1.3-mile walking tour. The project, first piloted in 2019, helps participants identify hidden data-collecting technologies that shape urban life. Each stop catalogs technical specifications, operational methods, and social implications of monitoring systems.

The tour spotlights ubiquitous surveillance cameras mounted on poles, ledges, and rooftops throughout downtown. These networked devices record continuously, enable remote control via pan-tilt-zoom capabilities, and transmit footage across digital infrastructure. At Amazon Go locations, overhead cameras track customer movement patterns without cashiers, raising questions about data collection practices and third-party sharing beyond consumer consent.

Seattle's automated license plate reader (ALPR) network reveals extensive vehicle monitoring. The Seattle Department of Transportation operates 99 stationary ALPRs for traffic analysis, while Seattle Police Department deploys 19 mobile units capable of 90-day data retention. These systems use optical character recognition to scan plates and feed databases that enable cross-agency sharing and private sector access through platforms like Thomson Reuters's CLEAR.

The guide emphasizes how unregulated surveillance creates scope creep, where license plate data originally collected for traffic purposes migrates into law enforcement and commercial databases without explicit consent. This technical infrastructure fundamentally alters public space dynamics, establishing permanent monitoring capabilities that outlast their original contexts.