Two stories about Flock camera misuse: Indianapolis and Washington DC

Our Take

PEP Radio's rundown of the Indianapolis case is exactly the kind of story we've been warning about since this site launched: give cops a searchable, networked database of every car's movements, and sooner or later someone will use it for something other than solving crimes. Five officers facing charges for misusing Flock data isn't a hypothetical slippery slope — it's the documented result of deploying mass surveillance infrastructure with minimal oversight and even less accountability. The Washington Post had to dig this out; it didn't come from a department proactively disclosing abuse.

The DC angle matters too, because it shows this isn't a one-city problem. Flock markets itself as a tool for solving specific crimes, but the audit trails, access controls, and consequences for misuse are left almost entirely to individual departments to police themselves. When the people with access to location histories on thousands of ordinary drivers are the same people deciding whether that access was appropriate, you get exactly what happened here — and probably a lot more that never makes it to a reporter's desk.

Thanks to PEP Radio for surfacing this. If you want to see whether these cameras are watching your own streets, check our camera map, and if you're ready to push back on your local department or city council, our take-action page has concrete steps.