Project Censored – Drones as First Responders / The Death of Freedom of Information
The short version: KPFA's Project Censored episode ties Drone-as-First-Responder surveillance to a broader collapse of public records access, and the two problems reinforce each other by design.
Our Take
Credit to KPFA Radio and host of this Project Censored segment for pairing two stories that are really one story. Beryl Lipton of EFF lays out how Drone-as-First-Responder programs let police departments launch camera-equipped drones over your backyard on the flimsiest of justifications, then feed whatever they capture into AI systems built on the same biased policing data that's driven decades of over-surveillance in Black and brown communities. That's not a bug. It's the business model.
The second half, with Ian Head of the Center for Constitutional Rights, is arguably the more dangerous story precisely because it's boring. When public records law gets gutted, agencies stop having to explain what they bought, how they're using it, or who's watching. Flock Safety and its ALPR network thrive in exactly that fog — vendors and police departments citing 'trade secrets' or 'law enforcement sensitive' to dodge basic questions about retention, sharing, and misuse. We've filed enough records requests to know the pattern: delay, redact, deny, repeat.
Drones and license plate readers are different technologies chasing the same outcome — a surveillance apparatus that operates faster than the public can question it. If you want to see what's already been deployed near you, check the map, and if you're ready to push back locally, our take-action page has the tools to start.
This is DeFlock The USA’s original commentary. The video above is the work of KPFA Radio, published on YouTube — full credit to the creator.