It's quite possible that they could use the footage to help find assailants or other criminals, where the footage of you might pose a violation of the law.
What I'm saying is that there's not necessarily any shady motive behind it. The problem is - and has always been - how to determine this.
But they [releases] are required to sell the video to 'clip show' producers (exemplars "Caught on Tape", "Outrageous Videos", Etc). One of the complaints in the 'stupid person falls in the fountain' case was that the security camera footage did not include a release.
What I'm saying is that there's not necessarily any shady motive behind it. The problem is - and has always been - how to determine this.