Articles
What the Flock?
An index of reporting, court records, and public filings showing what happens beyond Flock's public-safety claims. These are the documented problems, mistakes, and abuses that can be easy to miss when the story comes only from the vendor or the agencies using the cameras.
33 articles · page 1 of 2 · RSS
-
County supervisors vote to take down all sheriff's Flock cameras
montereycountynow.com
Monterey County supervisors voted 3-2 to decline a proposed $1.7 million, 10-year Flock Safety contract and directed the Sheriff's Office to end access to 63 cameras and remove them within 60 days. Deputies had queried the system nearly 20,000 times in a year, with an estimated 500,000 queries by partner agencies. Officials cited earlier improper out-of-state access; the sheriff and district attorney defended the technology.
-
Hutto City Council votes to end use of Flock Safety license plate readers
communityimpact.com
Hutto City Council voted unanimously on Sept. 18 to discontinue the police department's use of 10 Flock Safety license plate reader cameras, which were taken down before the vote. City staff cited concerns that partner agencies accessing the data are not bound by Hutto Police Department policies, along with questions about artificial intelligence developments. Nearby Pflugerville, Bastrop, Liberty Hill and Leander also recently ended Flock use.
-
Santa Rosa police chief faces packed house over controversial Flock cameras
yahoo.com
Santa Rosa Police Chief John Cregan held a forum attended by 400 to 500 people about the department's 143 Flock license plate reader cameras. Residents objected to contract terms granting Flock a perpetual license to the data and said outside agencies searched Santa Rosa data about 486,000 times a month versus roughly 5,000 local searches. Cregan said procedures had already been modified.
-
Boston drivers’ data left unsecured during Flock pilot due to vendor ‘error,’ city officials say
boston.com
Boston's 2025 annual surveillance report states that three days into a 45-camera Flock pilot, police found the nationwide data-sharing feature had been enabled by the vendor in error despite a contract barring sharing. BPD ordered it disabled and says it will not use Flock again. The report logged 15 watchlist requests, 12 approved, and no internal misuse complaints. More than 20 Massachusetts communities have ended or suspended Flock contracts.
-
Flock Cameras Are The New Patriot Act
thefederalist.com
An opinion piece traces the funding and legal lineage of automated license plate readers to post-9/11 surveillance programs, noting DHS grant channels and fusion centers that finance local purchases. It cites a Norfolk lawsuit showing one driver logged 526 times in four months, a California class action over federal and ICE access through a described side door, and an August 2026 study finding vehicle theft fell about 11 percent with no detectable gain in recoveries.
-
Liberty Hill City Council votes unanimously to end Flock Safety contract
cbsaustin.com
The Liberty Hill, Texas city council voted 7-0 to terminate its Flock Safety agreement, bar renewal in October, remove cameras under city jurisdiction and avoid future mass surveillance technology. Council members cited concerns over how license plate data is captured, stored and shared. Bastrop, Leander, Manor and Pflugerville have recently ended or moved to end Flock use, and Austin and San Marcos stopped in 2025.
-
Pa. lawmakers eye limits, outright ban on Flock cameras as they prepare for fall return
witf.org
Pennsylvania lawmakers from both parties have introduced at least nine bills to restrict or ban automated license plate readers, seven of them within six weeks, and both candidates for governor oppose the cameras. Proposals range from an outright ban to warrant requirements and local opt-outs. The Department of General Services is removing Flock from the COSTARS state contracting portal, while police chiefs and district attorneys oppose a blanket ban.
-
Oconomowoc Moves to Kill $18,000 Flock Camera Deal Amid Statewide Backlash
hoodline.com
Oconomowoc's Common Council is set to vote on cutting $18,000 from its budget, which would end the city's six Flock Safety license plate cameras after three years. The article compiles related Wisconsin developments: two former Milwaukee officers charged with using Flock to track ex-partners, a wrongful gunpoint stop caused by a stale alert, and contract terminations in Menasha, Stoughton, Sheboygan, and Fond du Lac County.
-
Manvel City Council Votes Unanimously To End Flock Safety Contract
texasscorecard.com
Manvel, Texas council members voted 6-0 to cancel the city's Flock Safety contract and cover its 16 license plate reader cameras within 48 hours. Mayor Dan Davis said 535 outside agencies retained access to the city's camera network after 149 were cut. A Flock representative said camera data helps train the company's AI. Police reported 138 department searches in a monthly audit with no sign of misuse.
-
Sheboygan votes to end Flock contract amid data concerns
wbay.com
The Sheboygan Common Council voted unanimously to end the city's contract with Flock Safety, effective at year's end, after officials said they found contract violations related to data management and sharing. The city had already covered its 15 cameras in August. Racine County, Fond du Lac County, Manitowoc, Kenosha and Winnebago County have also paused or ended agreements, while Milwaukee tightened access policies and launched transparency portals.
-
Lebanon shuts off Flock cameras after company fails to reply to letter with concerns
wvxu.org
Lebanon, Ohio, council voted to immediately shut off and cover 20 Flock Safety license plate readers after the company did not answer a mayoral letter containing 54 questions about data retention and access within 21 days. Officials cited Mountain View's discovery of a changed nationwide search setting and a reported offer to sell five years of data to Sheboygan, Wisconsin. A motion to terminate the contract failed 4-3.
-
New Bedford Councilor Burgo Moves To End Current Plate-Reader Contract
newbedfordguide.com
Councilor-at-Large Shane Burgo has proposed an ordinance letting New Bedford's automated license plate reader agreement expire and barring purchases, renewals, or expansions of mass location-tracking tools without a council hearing, published privacy study, data rules, and vote. The draft would disclose camera sites, generally require a warrant or case number for searches, ban data sales and most federal or out-of-state sharing, and mandate annual audits. Police suspended the Flock system in August during an audit and misconduct investigations.
-
Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley launches investigation into Flock Safety data usage
kcur.org
Sen. Josh Hawley, chair of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Counterterrorism, sent a letter to Flock Safety CEO Garrett Langley demanding documents on data safeguards by Sept. 8. Hawley cited a St. Charles County officer who ran Flock searches for personal reasons, plus alleged abuse in Wisconsin, Florida and California. He noted Flock reports more than 120,000 cameras and 20 billion monthly vehicle scans.
-
Fusion Center Ran Flock Searches on Behalf of Feds, Santa Ana Records Show
couriercalifornia.com
Logs released by Santa Ana police show the Northern California Regional Intelligence Center ran more than 27,000 searches of the city's Flock ALPR network over six months, including at least eighty on behalf of federal agencies such as the FBI, ATF, DEA, US Marshals, IRS and Forest Service, plus an agency in Washington state. California law bars sharing ALPR data with federal and out-of-state agencies. The logs omit usernames and case numbers, and no promised efficacy audit exists.
-
Residents voice concerns over Flock cameras at Santa Rosa Community Advisory Board Meeting
northbayvanguard.com
At a July 22 Community Advisory Board meeting, Santa Rosa Police Chief John Cregan presented on Flock cameras and ALPRs, and residents alongside the North Bay Organizing Project questioned auditing of outside agency searches, data retention, and crime-prevention metrics. The department says data is kept 30 days and not shared federally. Over 730,000 plate reads were logged in 30 days, with more than 300 California agencies granted access.
-
Flock sees controversial camera contracts canceled in 23 states
washingtonexaminer.com
Roughly 23 city councils have voted to cancel, reject, or deactivate Flock Safety license plate readers since January 2026, with about 98 doing so since 2021, according to the activist group Deflock. Harrisonburg and Elkton, Virginia, Framingham, Massachusetts, and Saranac Lake, New York, are among them, citing Fourth Amendment and data-sharing concerns. Flock says agencies own their data and set retention schedules.
-
6 more Ga. police department employees under investigation over alleged Flock camera misuse
wrdw.com
Savannah Police placed four officers and two civilian employees on administrative leave after an internal audit found searches unrelated to law enforcement, including queries about acquaintances and family members. One officer allegedly gave an outside agency access to the department's Flock system. All six cases went to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.
-
License Plate Reader Policy (Flock Safety)
flocksafety.com
The vendor's own published policy, included here as a primary source. It states that customers own the data their cameras collect, that records are hard-deleted on a rolling 30-day basis by default but adjustable by customer request, that customers decide whom to share with, and that Flock uses under one percent of images for machine learning.
-
Flock cameras track more than your license plate, and they're spreading fast
engadget.com
An overview of Flock Safety's camera network describes natural-language vehicle and person searches, over 100,000 ALPRs nationwide, and data sharing that gave ICE access via local police, including more than 1,400 Denver searches logged on ICE's behalf. It documents exposed cameras found by researcher Benn Jordan, dozens of officer stalking cases, misread plates leading to stops, and Denver's contract cancellation followed by an Axon award.
-
‘Creepy surveillance’: why some cities are shutting down Flock cameras amid privacy concerns
theguardian.com
Residents and council members in Dunwoody, Georgia pressed Flock Safety over a terms-of-service change and hacking demonstrations, deferring rather than cancelling a roughly half-million-dollar annual contract. Security researchers showed some Condor cameras streaming to the open internet and firmware passwords readable on a purchased device; Flock disputes the severity. Mountain View, Santa Cruz, South Pasadena, Flagstaff and Denver ended or paused programs, citing federal and out-of-state searches of local plate data.