Lawmakers Concerned Over Flock Camera Misuse

Our Take

When lawmakers start publicly questioning how Flock Safety's ALPR network is being used, that's not a partisan talking point — it's a signal that the guardrails everyone promised are thinner than advertised. Credit to Lisa Cabrera for putting a spotlight on this, because most of these concerns never make it past a city council meeting, let alone onto camera.

Flock's whole pitch rests on the idea that access to plate-read data is tightly controlled and only used for the narrow purposes departments agree to. But "misuse" stories keep surfacing precisely because the system was built for convenience, not restraint: thousands of departments sharing a searchable, nationwide log of where your car has been, with audit trails that depend on agencies actually checking their own work. When lawmakers start asking questions, it usually means someone already found a gap.

This is exactly why mapping where these cameras live matters — you can't hold a surveillance network accountable if you don't know it exists. Check our map to see what's been documented near you, and if you want to push back locally, our take-action page has concrete steps for talking to your city council before the next contract renewal.