Flock cameras draw concerns at Senate hearing

Our Take

News 8 Now's coverage of this Senate hearing is a welcome reminder that elected officials are starting to ask the questions many residents have been asking for years: who's watching these cameras, who has access to the data, and what happens when there's no warrant and no oversight? That a legislative body is even holding a hearing on Flock Safety's ALPR network suggests the public pressure campaign against unchecked plate surveillance is gaining real traction.

We don't have the full transcript, and we're not going to pretend we do, but the fact that "concerns" made it into the headline tells you something. Flock's pitch to city councils and police departments has always been "public safety first, questions later." When that pitch reaches a Senate hearing room, it means someone finally asked for the receipts — audit logs, retention policies, out-of-state data sharing agreements — and didn't love the answers.

This is exactly the kind of institutional scrutiny we want to see more of nationwide. If you want to know whether a camera like this is sitting at the end of your street, check our map, and if you want to push your own state lawmakers toward a hearing like this one, our take-action guide has the tools to get started. Credit to News 8 Now for putting this hearing on the record.