‘Cheat codes for hunters’: Idaho bill would help prevent pinpoint of wildlife locations
A bill aimed to prevent hunters from using precise radio collar locations and other data to track down wildlife, and prevent hunting critics from interfering with legal hunts, will head to the Idaho Senate after House lawmakers approved it Thursday.
House Bill 404, sponsored by Rep. James Petzke, R-Meridian, would give Idaho Department of Fish and Game officials an option to deny queries seeking GPS data, trail camera locations and radio telemetry frequencies. Currently the agency must respond to any public records request seeking that information.
Petzke, a hunter, said during a legislative committee meeting Monday that the goal of the bill is to preserve fair chase and hunting ethics.
“With all the technology available to sportsmen in today’s world, it can be tricky to determine what crosses the line into an unsportsmanlike advantage,” Petzke told lawmakers. He also said it could prevent hunting critics — including anti-wolf-hunting activists — from intervening in hunts.
The bill would add to an existing section of state law that exempts information on endangered species, oil and gas production, library patron activity and more from public view.
The Idaho Fish and Game Commission voted in support of the bill during its Jan. 25 meeting. Fish and Game spokesperson Roger Phillips told the Idaho Statesman in an email that the bill wouldn’t prevent the agency from sharing such information if it chooses to.He called the bill a “preemptive measure.”
“We are not trying to keep all this GPS collar data and other information from the public,” Phillips said. “The bill provides a legal means of blocking access to sensitive information, which we currently don’t have, if we suspect the data would be used for inappropriate activities. That could include a hunter attempting to locate animals through collar data or people opposed to hunting using collar data to disrupt legal hunts.”
Petzke told the Statesman in a phone interview that he had been working with Fish and Game officials on an unrelated issue when he learned wildlife location data was publicly available.
“That got my mind turning,” he said.
He then learned that the Idaho Wild Sheep Foundation shared similar concerns. Officials worried that bighorn sheep — one of the rarest hunting tags in Idaho — could be targeted using collar data.
“(Sheep are) pretty stationary, and you can use that data to essentially figure out which rock they’ll be standing on at a certain time of day,” Petzke said.
Petzke and Fish and Game officials said they didn’t have confirmed examples of wildlife location data being used to skirt fair chase in Idaho. Petzke said proving that would be difficult, since people aren’t required to disclose why they’re requesting the data.
During the floor debate Thursday, Petzke said Idaho Fish and Game received several location data records requests following media coverage of the bill.
Petzke said he’s received support from sportsman groups and other stakeholders.
“Everybody agrees: We shouldn’t be handing out cheat codes for hunters,” Petzke said.
