Police AI Is Becoming a Stalker’s Shortcut
The short version: AI Safety Watch spotlights 404 Media's reporting on cops abusing Flock ALPR access to stalk people, exposing the system's rotten accountability gap.
Our Take
Credit to AI Safety Watch for amplifying what 404 Media has been documenting for a while now: officers with Flock access keep getting caught running plates on exes, neighbors, and people they have no business tracking. This isn't a hypothetical risk analysts warn about in white papers — it's a pattern of real arrests. A tool pitched as crime-fighting infrastructure is, in practice, also a ready-made stalking machine for anyone with a badge and a login.
The uncomfortable truth is that Flock's audit logs and "policy" promises only work if agencies actually review them and discipline misuse — and plenty don't until a victim or a journalist forces the issue. That's the whole problem with building a nationwide vehicle-tracking network first and figuring out oversight later. Every camera added to the grid is another opportunity for someone to misuse it, and the people most at risk are rarely the ones with the power to audit the system.
If this story makes you wonder how close one of these cameras is to your own daily route, check our camera map and see what's already watching your neighborhood. Then head to our take-action page for ways to push back on unchecked ALPR deployment before it's your plate getting pulled up for the wrong reasons.
This is DeFlock The USA’s original commentary. The video above is the work of AI Safety Watch, published on YouTube — full credit to the creator.