Woman claims New Bedford officer used Flock cameras to follow her #shorts

Our Take

This is the nightmare scenario privacy advocates have been warning about since Flock cameras started multiplying on American streets: it's not hypothetical hackers or shadowy data brokers misusing this network, it's the people who already have the keys. WPRI's reporting on a New Bedford officer placed on leave for allegedly using department Flock cameras to track a woman is a reminder that "public safety infrastructure" is only as trustworthy as the humans who can log into it, and that audit logs after the fact are cold comfort to someone who's already been followed.

Flock and police departments love to point to internal audits and "access controls" as proof the system is safe. But audits catch misuse only after someone's privacy has already been violated — and only if anyone bothers to look. New Bedford's case didn't come from a proactive internal check catching a pattern; it came to light because the alleged target spoke up. That's not a system working as designed, that's a system getting caught.

Every camera added to this network is another point of leverage that can be pointed at an ex, a neighbor, a journalist, or anyone else an officer with access decides they want to watch. If you want to see how dense this surveillance grid already is where you live, check our camera map, and if you think your city council should be asking harder questions before approving more of these cameras, our take-action page has tools to help you push back. Credit to WPRI for surfacing this story — it's exactly the kind of local accountability reporting that keeps this technology from operating in the dark.