Florida Bans Flock Cameras on State Highways

Our Take

Credit to The Comments Show for flagging this one, because it's a big deal: Florida's DOT isn't just grumbling about ALPR overreach, it's yanking permits and telling operators to pull their cameras off state highway rights-of-way within 30 days. No new permits either. That's a state agency admitting, in writing, that the privacy concerns, misuse reports, and data-sharing red flags critics have been shouting about for years aren't paranoia — they're real enough to reverse course on.

This matters because Flock's whole business model depends on quiet, permanent infrastructure. Cameras get bolted to poles, folded into police budgets, and normalized before most residents even know they exist. Florida yanking highway permits is a rare case of the process running in reverse, and it shows these systems are not as untouchable as Flock and its law enforcement partners like to pretend. If a Republican-led state under Ron DeSantis is willing to strip permits over surveillance and misuse concerns, that's a signal other states and cities should be paying attention to.

Don't assume this fixes the problem statewide, though. The order applies to state highway rights-of-way — plenty of Flock cameras on county roads, city streets, and private contracts elsewhere in Florida are untouched. Check our camera map to see what's actually deployed near you, and head to take-action if you want to push your own city council or county commission to follow Florida's highway example.