Flock Safety and Homegrown Launch the Thriving Cities Fund
The short version: Flock's own promo video ties a $10M small-business fund to its surveillance pitch, using 'community investment' to soften scrutiny of its camera network.
Our Take
This one comes straight from Flock Safety's in-house channel, so treat it as an ad, not journalism. The pitch is simple: pair a feel-good $10 million small-business fund with Homegrown, wrap it in language about 'thriving communities,' and let the goodwill rub off on the company's actual product — a nationwide network of license plate readers feeding a private database that police departments pay to access.
It's a familiar playbook for surveillance vendors: sponsor the farmers market, fund the downtown façade grant, show up at the ribbon-cutting, and let local officials associate your brand with prosperity rather than with mass data collection. None of that changes what the cameras do once they're bolted to a pole — log every passing plate, timestamp it, and share it across a growing web of agencies with little public oversight. A charitable fund doesn't come with an opt-out for the people whose movements get tracked driving to those same 'thriving' downtowns.
Worth watching with that lens, and worth checking whether your city already has these cameras installed. Browse our map to see what's nearby, and if you want to push back on expansion in your community, our take-action guide has concrete steps.
This is DeFlock The USA’s original commentary. The video above is the work of Flock, published on YouTube — full credit to the creator.