Police Credit Flock Safety Cameras for Locating Missing Seniors

Our Take

Local news loves a rescue story, and cameras helping find a missing senior is exactly the kind of narrative Flock Safety wants attached to its brand. Credit where it's due: if these cameras genuinely helped bring someone home safely, that's a good outcome. But one or two success stories don't answer the harder questions about a system that's logging every plate, every car, every trip for everyone else too.

This is the classic playbook for expanding ALPR networks: lead with search-and-rescue, missing persons, and Amber Alerts, then quietly use the same infrastructure for routine policing, immigration referrals, and data-sharing agreements most residents never voted on or even know exist. Medina and Akron drivers aren't just getting help finding grandma — they're getting tracked every time they drive past a reader, with that data often kept far longer than anyone expects and shared with agencies well outside city limits.

We're not against technology that saves lives. We're against building a surveillance dragnet on the strength of anecdotes while skipping public debate about retention limits, audit trails, and who else gets to peek into that database. Check our map to see if Flock is already watching your commute, and if it is, use our action guide to push your city council for real transparency before the next feel-good headline becomes the justification for expanding it further.