Flock Praised Police Departments. Then This Happened.
The short version: Flock's own marketing case studies turned into cautionary tales once the police departments it praised got caught misusing ALPR data.
Our Take
Ted Yang's video digs up something Flock Safety would probably rather you forget: the company's own promotional material. Flock loves to parade police departments as success stories — proof that their camera networks are keeping communities safe. But as Yang lays out, several of those same spotlighted departments later became examples of exactly what critics have been warning about, from data misuse to scandals that make the original glowing press releases look pretty embarrassing in hindsight.
This is the pattern we keep seeing at DeFlock USA. A company sells itself on trust and accountability, but the moment a department gets caught running plates for personal reasons, sharing data with agencies it shouldn't, or just generally abusing the system, the marketing quietly disappears down the memory hole. The cameras don't. That's the real issue — these networks get built on promises, and the promises evaporate while the surveillance infrastructure stays put, usually expanding.
Credit to Ted Yang for connecting these dots and holding Flock's own words up against the record. If you want to see how far this infrastructure has spread in your own backyard, check our camera map, and if you're ready to push back on a local deployment, our take-action page has concrete steps to start with.
This is DeFlock The USA’s original commentary. The video above is the work of Ted Yang, published on YouTube — full credit to the creator.