Claim: Flock Surveillance Not To Track People
The short version: Respectsyoutech's footage of Condor cameras panning and zooming to track sidewalk movement undercuts Flock's talking point that its system isn't built to follow people.
Our Take
Flock Safety has spent years insisting its cameras are passive, license-plate-only tools that just happen to sit on public roads. Respectsyoutech's video pokes a hole in that framing by pointing a lens at the newer Condor units, which apparently pan and zoom to track moving objects along public sidewalks — not just cars rolling through an intersection. If a camera is actively swiveling to keep a pedestrian in frame, that's a meaningfully different capability than a static plate reader, and it deserves a different conversation about consent and oversight.
This matters because the entire public sales pitch for ALPR networks rests on the idea that they're narrow, limited-purpose tools. Once the hardware starts demonstrating pan-tilt-zoom behavior aimed at people walking down the street, the 'it's just for solving car thefts' line gets a lot harder to defend. Features like this tend to get added quietly, marketed to police departments as upgrades, and never put in front of the residents who actually live under these poles.
We'd rather you see the hardware for yourself than take anyone's word for it, ours included. Check our camera map to see what's been documented near you, and if you want to push back on expanding surveillance capabilities in your city, our take-action page has concrete steps for showing up at council meetings and filing records requests.
This is DeFlock The USA’s original commentary. The video above is the work of Respectsyoutech, published on YouTube — full credit to the creator.