Another local police department is making Flock camera changes
The short version: 5NEWS reports Van Buren, AR is the latest department tightening rules on who can access and how long Flock ALPR data is kept, a sign public pressure is working.
Our Take
Credit to 5NEWS for tracking this one, because these local policy tweaks rarely make the evening news — and they should. Van Buren joins a growing list of cities quietly rewriting the rules on who can query Flock's license plate database and for how long the footage sticks around. That's not nothing. Every added restriction on data sharing, retention, or outside agency access is a crack in a system that was built to expand first and ask permission later.
But let's be clear about what "limiting" usually means in practice: tighter internal policy, not fewer cameras, not public audits, and not a guarantee that data won't end up shared with ICE, bounty hunters, or whoever else pings the network next month. Flock's own audit logs have shown how porous these "policy" guardrails can be once hundreds of agencies are plugged into the same system. A department promising restraint today can reverse course — or get hacked, subpoenaed, or quietly expanded — tomorrow.
If Van Buren is on this list, there's a good chance a camera near you is too. Check our map to see what's tracking your plate, and hit take action for templates to push your own city council toward real transparency instead of press-release reassurances.
This is DeFlock The USA’s original commentary. The video above is the work of 5NEWS, published on YouTube — full credit to the creator.