I Can't Stop Looking for Flock Cameras 😂! #florida #daytona #criminalcase

Our Take

Patrick McGeehan, a retired homicide detective turned Daytona Beach criminal defense lawyer, posts this one half as a joke: he can't walk around D.C. anymore without instinctively checking traffic sign poles for Flock Safety cameras. It's a quick, funny clip, but the punchline doubles as a public service announcement. When a guy who spent a career on the law enforcement side of the table now can't turn off his ALPR radar, that tells you how normalized this surveillance infrastructure has become — and how invisible it is to everyone who hasn't trained themselves to look.

That's really the whole problem in a nutshell. These cameras are bolted onto ordinary-looking sign structures specifically so they blend into the streetscape. Most people drive past dozens of them a week without a clue their plate, location, and timestamp just got logged into a database that police departments and private company Flock Safety can query, sometimes without a warrant, sometimes sharing data across state lines. A defense attorney noticing the gaps and blank stretches where there isn't a camera is itself telling: it means he's mapped the network in his head because he knows it matters for his clients' cases.

You don't need a law degree to start doing the same thing. Check our camera map to see what's already documented near you, and if you spot a mount that isn't logged yet, or want to push back on your local council or police department, head over to our take-action page for steps that actually move the needle. Thanks to Patrick McGeehan for the laugh and the reminder that once you see these things, you can't unsee them.