Flock Safety's AI Surveillance Systems Spark Privacy Concerns Across U.S.
Flock Safety's automated license plate recognition (ALPR) cameras, deployed in over 5,000 communities across 49 U.S. states and scanning billions of vehicle images monthly, reportedly face mounting criticism over privacy violations, security flaws, and wrongful accusations. Activists, journalists, and civil liberties groups allege the systems lack adequate safeguards and create infrastructure prone to abuse, including data sharing with federal immigration officers and use in sensitive tracking cases.
What happened
Flock Safety's automated license plate recognition (ALPR) cameras, deployed in over 5,000 communities across 49 U.S. states, scan more than 20 billion vehicle images monthly and feed data into databases accessible by law enforcement.
Reports from the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and 404 Media allege that the surveillance technologies are prone to facilitating human rights violations, including wrongful accusations and unauthorized data access.
Reported impact
A Texas Sheriff's Office allegedly used the tool to track a woman suspected of having an abortion.
Data sharing practices with U.S. federal immigration officers have raised concerns about ALPR data being used to paint an intimate portrait of drivers' lives and chill First Amendment protected activity, including tracking of visits to health centers, immigration clinics, gun shops, union halls, protests, and centers of religious worship.
Index analysis
Flock Safety's products reportedly lack effective safeguards for privacy, creating surveillance infrastructure prone to abuse.
ALPR data can be accessed and shared by law enforcement agencies across thousands of other agencies, aggregating information that may reveal sensitive movement patterns.
Governance controls
Unlike traditional ALPR systems, Flock's model allows for widespread deployment without direct government oversight, often funded by private entities.
Classification
Sources and evidence
This record was researched and written by the Index, based on the following original reporting.