Some Flock Cams Can Read Your Phone!

Our Take

Credit where it's due: Mrs. Dave the Lawyer is doing the legwork that Flock Safety and its police customers won't, amplifying cybersecurity researcher Benn Jordan's finding that dozens of these camera systems had administrative interfaces sitting wide open on the internet. If that's accurate, it's not a hypothetical privacy concern anymore — it's an unlocked door into infrastructure that's already hoovering up location data on ordinary drivers.

The claim that some units may be picking up phone identifiers alongside plates is the part that should worry people most. Flock has always sold itself as a narrow, plate-reading tool, but the moment these cameras can also fingerprint nearby devices, you're talking about a system that tracks people, not just cars. Combine that capability with sloppy security practices and you get a surveillance network that's both more invasive than advertised and less protected than it should be — a bad combination when the data in question can map out where someone lives, works, worships, or seeks care.

This is exactly why we keep pushing people to look past the marketing and into the mechanics. Check our camera map to see what's already watching in your area, and if you want to push back on a system that's expanding faster than anyone is auditing it, our take-action page has concrete next steps.