Full transcript
about who is watching and who's
in charge is a tool promoted as
a way to fight crime fuels a
national conversation about
privacy, surveillance and
public oversight. Some of those
concerns are hitting home right
here in Utah communities.
Recently, a flock license
plate reader camera was
installed on a Millcreek City
property, but city leaders say
they never approved it. Now,
the camera has since been taken
down and removed. But as 2 News
investigates, Ariel Harrison
found out the bigger mystery
now how it got there in the
first place, and where else
this could be happening.
Who's accessing the footage
of the cameras? I don't think
we have a clear idea of who
that is.
As Sarah Whitley watches her
daughter play at Millcreek
Common, she says learning a
flock surveillance camera had
been mounted nearby without the
city's knowledge is unnerving.
That is concerning. If we
don't know who's putting them
up, and if it's not approved
through city council members or
even the public.
The device wasn't a typical
security camera. It was a flock
automated license plate reader
technology designed to capture
license plates and vehicle
characteristics that can then
be searched by authorized users.
Supporters say the cameras help
solve crimes and locate
suspects, but in Millcreek, the
city says it never agreed to
have one on his property.
We've removed that flock and
will continue to remove any
that we find have been placed
illegally.
Councilman Tom Deseret says.
Neither the city nor unified
police has a contract with
flock. Now, city leaders are
trying to answer the same
question community members are
asking who put it there?
Have you reached out to
flock to ask how it got there?
Probably will be, because we
do have one of their cameras in
our custody, the one that was
placed on our property. We took
it down. It's in our storage
and we're trying to figure out
why it was there in the first
place. And it makes me wonder
how many of these have been
placed illegally. We are
actively looking at every
single flock camera that's in
the city of Millcreek and
working to determine if it's
there legally or not.
Two news reached out to
Flock Safety, asking how one of
its cameras ended up on the
property without the city's
approval and who authorized the
installation. We are still
waiting for a response. The
discovery, though, is also
drawing attention at the state
Capitol.
It's equally concerning, I
think, is that they can take
the device down, but it's the
data that we're concerned about,
not the device.
State Senator Stephanie
Pictures district includes
Millcreek. She says the debate
isn't just about the cameras,
it's about transparency. Who is
collecting information, how
long it's being kept and who
can access it. Questions she
says lawmakers may soon have to
answer.
I think we have to start
with transparency. That's sort
of like the building block for
building good policy in this
space.
While Millcreek is
investigating how a flock
camera ended up on city
property here, other law
enforcement agencies seem to be
embracing this technology.
Within the past week, Garfield
County announced it's installed
eight of these flock cameras
along major highways. Further
explaining, though, that every
search involving the data must
be tied to a legitimate law
enforcement i