Full transcript
What's up guys? Welcome to another video
of Dev Talks with your host Travon and
in this video, I actually got to talk
about something really, really
controversial. Uh we don't talk about
too much controversy around here, but
Flock cameras are becoming a nuisance to
everybody around them. So, I've actually
talked about
Um I've talked to a police officer about
this uh about them putting up cameras
everywhere and them using drones now and
all this other technology stuff. And
going from there and what it's meant to
be used for and how it's going against
our rights and
all this other net um stuff that's going
across the board. There's a lot of stuff
going on about these Flock cameras. And
as you can see, this is from May. So,
the past few months it's been picking up
more and more and more and I even hear
people that I know in my family that
have issues about these cameras. So,
without further ado, don't forget to
like, comment, subscribe, and share and
let's dive right in.
It's intensifying across the country.
Your community is telling you that we
don't want this.
I think we should completely remove
them.
Here in Pasadena, California, residents
and city leaders grapple with what to do
about Flock, the leading manufacturer of
auto
Let's take a look at
the people in this, right? This is the
reason why it creates so many issues.
Do any of these people look like
they live in neighborhoods with high
crime?
Sit on that for a second because this
has me I I talked to a gentleman once uh
and as we sit on this, I talked to a
gentleman once in uh DC when I was
visiting DC once
and he was talking about the time when
they had the National Guard all in DC.
By the way, it's seemed a lot safer. You
walking around, you see the National
Guard people everywhere patrolling. You
see the crime statistics go down. You
see how much guns they recover all and
all the other stuff going on.
Um between having more enforcement, lot
more law enforcement out there in the
streets
uh doing what they got to do, right?
And I've seen a lot of mixed reviews,
especially from black people, from white
people, from people who live in
different area codes.
And what has come from it?
Everybody has an issue with this
until they are the ones that are
affected by crime.
Everyone had an issue with
the National Guard being around in
certain areas of the city because they
don't experience that level of crime in
their city, so they feel like they're
being over
patrolled, right?
This is This is going to be similar to
the Flock camera and there's
There's some mistakes. We're going to
cover the mistakes of the
uh Flock camera crap in a minute because
I'm I'm going full into this. There
There's a few things that
that happened that I don't agree with
that's going above and beyond, but
this gentleman said said the same thing
at first. He was like, "Yeah, it seems a
bit much,
especially for this area, you know,
uh
you know, I feel really safe most of the
time when you're in certain areas. These
people, I bet you in their community,
they don't ever think anything's going
to happen to them
leaving their door. Not a single day
goes past them where they don't think,
"Hey, this person's going to rob me."
These These There's literally a gang
that sits on that corner right there and
they're a gang. And I can't ever go down
that way because
what if they did something to me?
They've never walked by a group of
people before and was like
I can't cross the street right now
because they going to think I'm weak.
And then they going to make me a target.
And then something's going to happen to
me.
Then I seen the videos where
this grandma, her nephew or whatever,
grandson, nephew, an aunt, whoever it
was in DC, crying because he literally
got killed.
Leaving some girl crib.
And they like, "Yes, we need them here
to protect us to make sure that this
don't happen and go get the people who
killed my family members."
And how do you do that? Well, Flock sat
here and they said, "Let's put up
cameras so when the crime happens, we
can track these criminals all across the
city and do stuff." But the problem is
it's never 100% perfect. Same thing with
law enforcement. Nobody's going to be
100% perfect cuz we live in an imperfect
world.
D.C. leaders grapple with what to do
about Flock, the leading manufacturer of
automated license plate readers or
ALPRs.
The cameras are installed at
intersections and capture detailed
vehicle data, which AI can analyze to
identify people and alert authorities
who say it's an important crime-fighting
tool. But critics argue the cameras have
created a mass surveillance network
that's been tapped by federal
immigration agencies like ICE to surveil
protesters and monitor individuals.
The battle over controversial Flock
cameras in Troy is heating up.
It's playing out across the country,
from Troy, New York, where the mayor
declared an emergency to keep the
cameras running after public pushback.
Get the Flock out of Troy. Thank you
very much.
To Dayton, Ohio, where authorities took
to covering its cameras with what looks
like garbage bags after the city voted
to suspend Flock. Across the country, at
least 57 municipalities have canceled or
let their contracts with Flock expire
over the past year with 15 more
rejecting proposed Flock contracts due
to community pushback according to data
compiled by NBC News.
So, this is above and beyond the license
plate detection and you can see that it
sort of follows him in the shot.
Yadi Yauncey and Nick Rabb are
co-founders of Deflock Pasadena, a
grassroots organization hoping to
pressure Pasadena to cancel its existing
contract with Flock.
What's the biggest concern here?
I think the biggest concern is that if
these technologies were used and the
data got through to ICE and led to a
raid or is used by police for a wrongful
conviction, they basically ruin
someone's life.
There needs to be more community input
and consensus and consent before
deploying this and any other mass
surveillance technology.
Deflock activists requested public
records reviewed by NBC News find
This
I I'm skipping ahead because there's
other things that I want to cover in
regards to this.
But the main thing that they're issuing
about Flock
is not what we should be even worrying
about.
They're talking about the data going to
ICE
automatically.
Not even law enforcement. It's up to law
enforcement and this is why I skipped to
this part of the video because I I want
you guys to see what the police actually
deal with and they have their decisions
and choices and the mayor dictates what
they have going on in that particular
city.
That that person created a whole
organization to combat ICE
from potentially finding ways to get
criminals and things like that.
Flock is for the police department
locally
to be able to find criminals, track the
criminals down, find stolen vehicles and
things like that. Like I said, I talked
to a police officer before and he said
that a lot of people already are sitting
there and they don't want to call the
police
when crimes happen
so that they have to sit there and find
other ways to be able to track criminals
and get them quicker and know where
they're at. So they're not spending 2
weeks in a manhunt, they can find that
dude in the hour.
They go straight to his crib. They don't
got to look around, do all that. They
send investigators to the crime scene,
other person's going to arrest him
immediately. He going to his baby mama's
house to go camp out and hide and the
police already know he there because
they followed him on the camera all the
way there. They followed him They had a
drone in the sky. He He said, "They got
drone operators for the police now
who will go out their home,
put open a drone, it will fly in the sky
and watch and follow them as they run
away from the crime scene."
From the sky.
And you won't even know.
Cuz who going to hear a drone flying
that high up in the air? They won't even
know that they being tracked.
It's supposed to help them get to the
crime criminals quicker
and to help prevent people from doing
stuff like this. But mistakes happen cuz
remember we we got videos that going
into mistakes. But these people are
concerned about ICE. The real concern is
about when the mistakes actually happen.
And that we're going to get into and all
the other controversial stuff going into
it. That's what they need to be
complaining about, not I this whole ICE
stuff getting illegal immigrants.
Illegal ones. And yes, it's going to
make mistakes.
Everything makes mistakes. You make
mistakes.
I make mistakes.
Technology makes mistakes.
Things happen.
Try to prevent them, but things happen.
Where you watch all
the magic unfold.
It It's completely changed the game.
Like in Alameda County, where the
sheriff's office says the technology has
been invaluable.
We got a behind-the-scenes look at how
Flock technology is being used.
You hear an alert tone, what does that
tell you?
So, the alert tone is related to the
license plate readers and it lets us
know that there's been an activation.
There's one right now uh on a vehicle
traveling past one of our cameras that
are positioned in a public place.
What does that mean exactly?
That could mean a number of things. Uh
that camera network is hooked up to the
Department of Justice, so the stolen
vehicle system. Uh could be armed
robbery car, carjacking, a murder
vehicle.
I mean, this thing is going off.
We get a lot of alerts in this county.
While it may receive information from
federal law enforcement, Alameda County
insists the data isn't flowing the other
way.
And before I get to that,
they get a lot of alerts sitting here.
What would be easier for the police
department to sit there within their
patrol cars
texting
and looking for scanning license plates
manually, or having a camera set up in
positions to that can do it instead?
We have absolutely no external sharing
with any federal agencies or
immigration. There is no way they could
access our data uh without our
knowledge.
The three remaining Alameda County
supervisors voted yes with
In April, Alameda County leaders voted
narrowly to extend its Flock contract
for several more months despite concerns
from residents.
This technology is used specifically
related to calls for service, 911 calls
for help um and and to stop criminals.
If we remove this technology, it's going
to be a big detriment to to public
safety.
Back in Pasadena,
there is
definite benefit
to have
So,
in my opinion, there is a huge benefit
to having cameras like this.
But in one end of it,
you can lose out on a lot of your
rights,
things that you have going on.
You you feel monitored 24/7.
And everybody's worried about data
breaches. What happens when the police
department experiences a data breach
with these cameras?
There's a lot of different x's and o's
to worry about and think of, but in one
end of things,
they have data on how much they are
saving on time, being more efficient in
stopping criminals, and getting
investigations done,
and their improvement from these
cameras. But on the other end of things,
there is still that small
that small percentage of incidents like
this one that happens um right here
where false things tend to tend to
occur. And this is where the criticism
should lie. This and another one that I
have right after this.
with new technology [music]
has led to a tense showdown between a
Minnesota man and Plymouth police
officers. They thought he'd stolen a
$150,000
car based on bad information in the
Flock system. Fox 9's Courtney Haggard
shows us the consequences and what an
innocent man's story says about the
broader increase in surveillance.
Rolling around in a Range Rover is all
in a day's work for automotive
journalist Joel Feder, but the drive.com
did not sign him up for what happened
when he walked out of Kohl's in
Plymouth.
And I see two cop cars lit up with with
sirens blasting coming in the in the
backup camera from the passenger side.
Then I look to my left in the the glass,
and all of a sudden I see two more cop
cars coming from my driver side. So now
I'm boxed and pinned in, and I got four
cop cars, lights going.
Can you come out to me, please?
Feder followed every order from wary
officers.
Are you are you armed at all?
No. No.
He says the officers had their hands on
their holsters, but they never drew
weapons, so the interaction stayed tense
but manageable. And eventually an
officer revealed the reason for their
suspicion.
The reason you have four cops here is
because your license plate is registered
as stolen license plates.
Fetter had enough documentation to
convince them it was not stolen and
found out he'd been on their radar for a
while.
It hit on our
hit on our license plate readers the
other day, too. So
I said
"How do you do that?" And they said,
"Well, there's Flock cameras around
here."
Tens of thousands of Flock cameras
automatically read license plates all
over the country. The company reports 20
billion vehicles pass its cameras every
month and its readers accurately capture
93% of the license plates. Plymouth
alone has 15 intersections with Flock
cameras, including this one that tracked
Fetter right into the Kohl's parking
lot. But even when the camera reads the
plate correctly, human error can lead to
surveillance mistakes.
My plate was 3410 DTM.
The plate Flock picked up was 34 DTM.
That 10 didn't seem to matter.
Police believe someone in LA originally
reported a plate missing with different
small numbers where the 10 was on this
Range Rover.
I'm pretty sure it's the other plate
that's got stolen or lost.
Flock's 7%
So
that's the first thing, right?
Cuz it's tragic on its own. It's it's
really annoying to have to deal with
you know, getting falsely accused,
getting falsely stopped and
things cuz technology makes mistakes. It
got close.
It was missing the 10.
It got close.
But hey, whoever was called out on the
scene, they they probably didn't look at
the plate after and
because they I'm pretty sure when they
get alerted, they say, "Hey, this one's
stolen. This is the license plate. It's
right here. It picked up on it twice."
And then you look at it and you're like,
"Oh, it's that one has a 10 on it. This
one's not the right one." And skip over
it. They didn't do that. they just sent
everybody out
to go get them.
They just immediately just sent them all
out to go get them.
The bigger issue that I have is actually
this one that this woman posted on
Twitter.
[snorts]
This woman posted this on Twitter and
she got a hefty ticket.
A hefty hefty hefty ticket.
Makes no sense at all
how you
Let's just dive into it.
for having my phone on my lap, face
down. Just got a $1,250
ticket in the mail for having my phone
on my lap, face down, and both hands on
the steering wheel.
Pretty cool.
Yeah.
She got a $1,200 ticket
for having her hands on the steering
wheel. Where's her phone at? Right
there. Her phone's right on her lap
in this little area, right on her left
lap,
on and face down.
And they're like, "Nah, she's she has
her phone out while she's driving."
Which she could have.
She could have at one point in time.
That's why it's on her lap instead of
hanging up somewhere or being put away.
She could have been on her phone.
In all seriousness,
she could have literally been on her
phone
and put her phone down on her lap
and the and she happened to drive
through a flood camera and they just
caught caught it on her lap. And now
she's not using it, so you can't use
that as proof
because she's not in the act of using
it. But most likely if someone's phone's
on their lap, they probably did use it
at some point in time while they were
driving.
Cuz it's not put away somewhere.
So,
but for me,
I don't think that she should have
gotten a because this isn't proof that
she was on it.
Like I said, it's going to make
mistakes. It's going to catch people.
It's going to be out here.
Um a lot of errors are going to
continuously happen, which are which is
literally insane. And people are going
to complain about this. This is what
I'll be more mad about. I'd be so mad
just getting tickets because they
screenshot what's going on in my car
and
from some random interstate and they're
like, "Oh, no, this bad."
And try to send you a ticket get home.
That's That's where These instances I I
would draw the line more at. Where they
coming after you and and then they don't
The people in the police department
don't sit there and they don't review
the plates and make sure it's the one
that's in the system and they just send
people out. That's where I would be more
upset about.
The errors. But there's always going to
be errors. But in the same breath
things, if you guys want to be safer in
certain communities or if you want
public safety to be even better,
this is one of the things that are going
to advance it further. Now, the AI
system may needs some improvement. The
technology, it's going to need some
improvement, but it's only going to get
better in time.
If you get rid of them completely, they
can't improve it.
Especially they can't improve it as
fast. You try all and error.
It's just crazy that
everybody here is the guinea pigs.
Literally everybody around is is the
guinea pigs that are on these cameras.
But let me know what you guys think in
the comments down below. Don't forget to
like, comment, subscribe, and share. I
really appreciate you all so so much.
Thank you for tuning in. Let me know if
there's anything else that you guys want
me to cover that may pop out for you
guys. But without further ado, peace.
See you next time.