US Senate LIVE: “Who Is Watching?” Senate Grills Flock Over Nationwide Camera Surveillance
The short version: Mint's livestream of senators questioning Flock Safety executives is a rare moment of federal daylight on a surveillance network that's grown with almost zero oversight.
Our Take
Credit to Mint for airing this hearing in full, because moments like this are exactly what Flock Safety has avoided for years: elected officials asking, on the record, who actually watches the watchers. A nationwide web of automated license plate readers scanning tens of millions of plates a day didn't happen through public debate or legislative design — it happened through quiet police department contracts and a sales pitch to city councils that rarely asked hard questions. Senators doing that job now, even belatedly, matters.
What we'll be watching for is whether this hearing produces anything beyond talking points — real answers on data retention, who gets access to that data (including federal agencies like ICE and CBP), audit trails for misuse, and whether communities ever truly consented to being mapped this way. Flock's business model depends on cameras being invisible and uncontroversial. A Senate hearing, by definition, makes them neither.
If you want to see how close this surveillance is to your own front door, check our camera map, and if you're ready to push back locally, our take-action page has tools for exactly that.
This is DeFlock The USA’s original commentary. The video above is the work of Mint, published on YouTube — full credit to the creator.