An $8 Billion Company Can't Tell A 7 From A 2, And Innocent People Got Hurt

Our Take

DontLieToMe just did the math Flock Safety hopes nobody checks: in Roseville, California, the company's own numbers show a 71% misread rate on plate alerts, not the 96% accuracy Flock advertises to city councils and cops. That gap isn't academic. It's the difference between a routine patrol and a family getting guns drawn on them, or a police dog unleashed on someone whose only crime was driving a car with a plate that looked kinda like the one on a hot list.

This is the core problem with ALPR networks scaled to 20 billion scans a month across 5,000+ agencies: the system is built for speed and volume, not for the kind of accuracy that should be a prerequisite before someone's life is put at risk. Flock's OCR engine reading a 7 as a 2 isn't a rare glitch, it's a predictable failure mode of mass, automated surveillance that gets rubber-stamped as reliable because the marketing says so. And because these networks are increasingly searchable nationwide without a warrant, one bad read in California can ripple into a stop hundreds of miles away.

Credit to DontLieToMe for pulling the Business Insider, Gizmodo, and Gadget Review threads together into one clear picture. If you want to see how many of these cameras are already watching your commute, check our camera map, and if you're ready to push back on your local council, our take-action guide is the place to start.