Michigan Camera Alerts Are Not Proof
The short version: The Mitten Grip rightly reminds Michigan viewers that a Flock hit is a lead, not a conviction, and treating it as proof invites wrongful stops.
Our Take
Credit to The Mitten Grip for saying out loud what Flock Safety itself buries in fine print: a camera alert is a computer's best guess, not a verdict. OCR misreads plates, owners sell cars, and a 'hit' can just as easily mean a paperwork lag as a crime in progress. When officers (or homeowners, or HOA patrols) treat that green flag as settled fact, the person behind the wheel pays the price for a system's error rate.
This matters because the whole pitch for blanket ALPR networks rests on the idea that the tech is precise enough to justify pulling someone over, running their info, or escalating a stop. It isn't, and Flock's own guidance says so. Every camera bolted to a pole in a Michigan subdivision is generating alerts that get treated as probable cause long before anyone bothers to confirm the read, the registration, or the actual circumstances.
If you want to know how many of these cameras are watching your commute, check our camera map, and if your town is debating a Flock contract, our take-action page has the questions your city council should have to answer before another one of these 'leads, not proof' systems goes up.
This is DeFlock The USA’s original commentary. The video above is the work of The Mitten Grip, published on YouTube — full credit to the creator.