University at Buffalo to Pilot 20 License Plate Reader Cameras
The short version: WKBW TV reports UB is quietly testing 20 license plate readers in a 60-day pilot — a familiar first step toward permanent campus-wide surveillance.
Our Take
Credit to WKBW TV in Buffalo for catching this one early. A "60-day pilot" sounds harmless, almost scientific, but anyone who's tracked Flock Safety's rollout playbook across the country knows how this movie usually ends: the trial quietly becomes permanent, the camera count creeps up, and nobody votes on it again. Campuses are especially easy targets for this pitch — administrators get to say they're "doing something" about safety, while students and staff become a captive population whose daily movements get logged without much say in the matter.
What's missing from most of these announcements is the stuff that actually matters: who can query the data, how long it's stored, whether it's shared with local police or federal agencies, and what happens when the "pilot" quietly becomes infrastructure. Universities aren't just workplaces, they're communities people live in — and a network of plate readers at every entrance turns a campus into a checkpoint system, one trip to class at a time.
If you're in Buffalo or anywhere else wondering whether your neighborhood, workplace, or school already has these cameras watching, check our camera map to see what's been documented nearby, and visit our take-action page if you want to push back before a 60-day test turns into a permanent fixture.
This is DeFlock The USA’s original commentary. The video above is the work of WKBW TV | Buffalo, NY, published on YouTube — full credit to the creator.