Flock Cameras: Deputies Caught Tracking Women Plus Two More Stories
The short version: A roundup from Revenge Of The Cis spotlights deputies allegedly misusing Flock cameras to track women, underscoring how easily ALPR networks can be turned into personal surveillance tools.
Our Take
Credit to Revenge Of The Cis for stitching together three separate Flock stories into one arc, because that's really the point — these aren't isolated incidents, they're a pattern. Allegations that Pinellas County deputies used license plate reader data to track women is exactly the nightmare scenario critics of this technology have been warning about since day one: give law enforcement a tool that logs everyone's movements, and sooner or later someone with a badge will use it for something other than solving crimes.
Flock and its boosters love to say the system only flags stolen cars and wanted plates. But the database doesn't know the difference between a legitimate investigation and a deputy running plates on an ex, a crush, or anyone else they've taken a personal interest in. Audit logs exist on paper, but as we've seen again and again, logs only matter if someone is actually reviewing them — and agencies have shown little appetite for policing their own.
The other two stories in the video reportedly round out the picture of just how normalized this surveillance infrastructure has become, from private citizens buying into the system to new deployments popping up with little public debate. If you want to see how dense this network already is near you, check our camera map, and if you're ready to push back on a city council or county commission, our take-action page has concrete steps to start that fight.
This is DeFlock The USA’s original commentary. The video above is the work of Revenge Of The Cis, published on YouTube — full credit to the creator.