Northeast Ohio dispatcher’s alleged Flock camera misuse prompts new audit policy

Our Take

Credit to 19 News for digging into this one: a Northeast Ohio dispatcher allegedly used Flock Safety's license plate reader network for reasons that had nothing to do with public safety, and it took that misuse becoming public before Highland Heights police bothered to write an audit policy. Notice the order of operations — the surveillance infrastructure went in first, the rules for who can touch it came later, after someone already abused it. That's not an accident, that's the standard playbook for ALPR rollouts nationwide.

Flock and its police customers love to tell the public these cameras are only for catching violent criminals and recovering stolen cars. But the tech has zero built-in limits on curiosity, jealousy, or vendettas. An employee with a login can look up an ex, a neighbor, a coworker, a journalist — and unless someone happens to audit the logs after the fact, nobody ever knows. Audit policies written after a scandal are damage control, not prevention. They tell you the agency already knew this kind of abuse was possible and didn't act until it blew up in the press.

This is exactly why we track where these cameras live and push people to get involved before their town's department has its own scandal. Check our camera map to see what's watching your area, and if your city council hasn't put real audit and retention limits in place, use our take-action resources to make them do it now, not after the next dispatcher gets caught.