Flock Blasted

Our Take

Kyler Himes and the UFD Tech crew aren't a policy shop — they're a tech channel with an audience that clearly got fed up enough to torch Flock Safety's "public safety" marketing in a video titled, bluntly, "Flock Blasted." We're not going to pretend we know every beat of their script, but the headline alone tells you something: the company's messaging is cracking under scrutiny from people who aren't privacy lawyers or EFF staffers, just regular creators who noticed the gap between what Flock says ALPRs do and what the cameras are actually capable of.

That gap is the whole story. Flock pitches its network as a quiet, automated helper for local cops chasing stolen cars, but the underlying system is a nationwide, searchable log of where your car has been — timestamped, shareable across agencies, and largely invisible to the public until someone points a camera at the camera. When a tech channel with no horse in the surveillance-policy race starts mocking the pitch, it's a sign the PR isn't landing the way Flock wants, and that's worth amplifying.

If this video makes you curious about whether Flock or similar ALPR rigs are already watching your street, check our map to see what's been documented near you, and if you want to push back at a city council meeting or file records requests, our take-action page has the tools to get started. Credit to UFD Tech for putting this in front of an audience that might otherwise never hear Flock's name.