Arkansas State Troopers Now Redacting Crash-Report Data

Arkansas State Police is citing a 21-year-old federal privacy law as their reason for withholding information from vehicle crash reports.

The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reports that the agency’s new policy, which began June 4, means the only personal information available on crash reports are the names and hometowns of fatalities.

Other information, including the names of other drivers and passengers, is withheld.

The 1994 Drivers Privacy Protection Act prohibits personal information from motor vehicle reports from being made public. The state agency contends the law also covers police crash reports.

An agency spokesman says that new software has given it the means to now make the redactions. The agency said that manually redacting the information before on thousands of crash reports was too much of an administrative burden.