We Fought Flock Cameras and Won. Now There Is A BIGGER Problem!

We've talked about Flock cameras before, the ones that photograph every vehicle that passes and builds a 30-day record of where you've been. Well, we have some important updates. The story used to be about rapid expansion and early warning signs. Now, the picture has shifted in ways that matter to every driver. New high-profile mistakes are still surfacing, including one where police tracked an automotive journalist in a press vehicle for days before boxing him in and his wife with multiple cruisers in a parking lot. They believed the car was stolen. At the same time, real pushback is working and dozens of cities and towns have dropped their Flock contracts after residents and drivers spoke up. Your voice actually matters. The issue has helped build momentum. But, here's the part nobody wants to hear. The cameras aren't disappearing. Other companies are stepping in to take over the contracts and keep the same surveillance model running under new names. And some of these systems are now being pointed directly at entrances to stores that sell firearms and at parks and retail locations. This isn't a story that resolved itself. It's one that's changing form while the core problem remains. Before we continue, I want to remind you to like, subscribe, and click that bell for notifications because there's a lot of news coming fast and furious in the automotive industry. These cameras collect data on millions of vehicles regardless of whether the driver is suspected of a crime. These systems are marketed as indispensable tools to fight crime, but they ignore the powerful tools police already have to track criminals, such as cell phone location data, creating a loophole that doesn't require a warrant. Joel Feder of The Drive was reviewing a Range Rover press vehicle when a Flock alert incorrectly identified the manufacturer plate as stolen. The reason you have four cops here is because your license plate is registered as stolen license plates in our system. You serious? Police tracked the vehicle for days before surrounding him with multiple squad cars in a shopping center parking lot. The error was traced to a data entry mistake combined with license plate recognition error. The Flock camera misread the license plate 3410 DTM as 34 DTM, incorrectly flagging it as stolen. A man who bought a used car that was already flagged by Flock, Brandon Upchurch of Ohio, purchased a used pickup truck. A Flock camera misread his license plate and incorrectly associated with a stolen vehicle. Police stopped him, arrested him, and the police dog bit him before officers realized he was the lawful owner. He later filed a lawsuit. I hope he wins. JC and Carolyn Herrin of Tennessee, grandparents driving their 3-year-old granddaughter to a doctor's appointment, were stopped at gunpoint after a Flock alert said their personalized plate "Luvy" was stolen. The actual stolen vehicle had a nearly identical plate using the number zero instead of the letter O, and that stolen vehicle had already been recovered, but had never been removed from the hot list. Steven Melvin of South Carolina was held at gunpoint after a Flock camera incorrectly flagged his black BMW as stolen. He filed a lawsuit against York County Sheriff's Office alleging deputies relied on the automated alert without adequate verification. Again, I hope he wins that lawsuit. The Sherwood family of Arkansas, including a 1-month-old baby, was ordered out of their vehicle at gunpoint after a Flock camera misread one character on the license plate generating a false stolen vehicle. Recent misuse has also raised concerns beyond technical errors. In Georgia, at least 10 officers were arrested for using Flock's database for personal searches with the company's new audit tool flagging the activity. The incidents have fueled debate over privacy and Fourth Amendment protections, leading cities like Los Angeles to suspend Flock camera contracts over data ownership disputes. This follows the same pattern we've seen before. A single bad entry or AI misread gets amplified across a connected network. The cameras don't just read the plates, they log make, model, color, and visual details. We've discussed this before, and then they make that information searchable for any participating agency. Police have been told to verify alerts. Yet, the real-world stops show that verification sometimes happens only after the fact. When the input data is imperfect, the output is, too. Flock's own materials describe the value coming from the ability to follow vehicles and even people across locations. publications, 700,000 crimes a year are solved with Flock. Flock Safety Chief Communications Officer Josh Thomas. reported crimes in America. Yeah, so there's a lot more that probably are being helped that aren't being reported. Um but yes, we have about 700,000 crimes that we are aware of that are being solved in part with evidence that's derived from a Flock Safety device. In order for that historical data to be of investigative value, you have to track every car for 30 days. You Again, I would challenge you on the word track. Tracking the whole of your movements is very different than knowing that you passed by one specific camera, 24 specific cameras. Those are different things. And then the examples of tracking that vehicle from location to location to location. But Flock's own webinars talk about its license plate reader's ability to track vehicles and people. The expansion into private retail adds another layer. Chains like Academy Sports and Outdoors have installed Flock cameras as virtual perimeters around the stores, with some units aimed straight at the customer entrance. Every car that pulls in is recorded with time and location. These stores sell firearms and hunting supplies alongside everything else. The data makes no distinction between someone buying a cooler and someone buying ammunition or hunting gear. What we're watching is not the end of the surveillance approach. It's a transition. Cities that canceled Flock are not removing license plate readers entirely in most cases. They're replacing them with systems from other vendors, often with slightly different contract language around data sharing or retention periods. The core capability, photographing every vehicle and storing the movement, stays in place. The debate has moved from whether to collect this data on everyone to who gets to run the database under what rules. This directly touches Fourth Amendment protections. The recent Supreme Court decision in Chat reverses United States made clear that the detailed third-party location data carries constitutional weight. Yet, vehicle movement records captured on public roads continue to be collected at scale with far less individualized process than traditional warrants require. When that same data infrastructure gets pointed at retail locations tied to constitutional activities, the questions become sharper. Recent misuse has also raised concerns beyond technical errors. Like I mentioned before in the state of Georgia, those 10 officers were using the Flock database for personal searches, and they were arrested as well as fired, of course. But, these incidences have fueled debate over privacy and Fourth Amendment protections. Meanwhile, an independent effort called De-Flock is doing the opposite of what the companies want. There's a link down below, and it's deflock.org if you want to check it out. It's an open-source project and app that maps known automated license plate reader locations across the country. People are using it to see exactly where the cameras sit in their communities. Some are even changing their routes to avoid them. The transparency is a motivating action. Residents are showing up at meetings with specific addresses and asking hard questions about contracts, data retention, and verification procedures. That public mapping is turning abstract concerns into concrete local accountability, and you can go on and report cameras as well. Flock built a large business selling this capability, but its recent controversies have created an opening. Competitors are moving in to capture the contracts that cities are re-bidding. Axon, already deeply embedded with police departments through body cameras and evidence systems, has picked up several of the accounts that are left by Flock. Other established players are also positioning themselves as the better governed alternative. Motorola Solutions or Vigilant Solutions operates as one of the oldest and largest nationwide ALPR networks used by state police and local agencies. Rekor Systems offers AI-based roadway intelligence. Genetec AutoView is widely used in large municipalities and universities. Elsag, spelled e l s a g, now part of the L Nardo Group, which we talked about last week, is another long-established provider. This is the same company behind Signal Trace, which combines ALPR data with signals from nearby electronic Bluetooth devices. We talked about this. It is tracking and pulling together information from devices, your watch, your AirPods, literally everything to create a dossier on you. And if you never gave permission for them to do this, how are they connecting all this data in your car and from you to put together this information? The money follows the data. Every new contract, whether it stays with Flock or moves to another provider, means more cameras, more stored records, and more reoccurring access fees. Private retailers gain security monitoring at low marginal costs, and law enforcement gains a tool that requires less traditional investigative work. The driver on the road supplies the raw material without compensation or meaningful consent. When one company faces pushback, another simply steps in at the same revenue stream. Now, we talk every week about not overpaying at the dealership or at the pump or on your insurance, but if I told you that you were overpaying on your car insurance by hundreds of dollars a year, you'd fix it today. So, why are so many people doing exactly that when it comes to Medicare? When you turn 65 years old, you're required to apply. Most people pick a Medicare plan once and never look at it again. Meanwhile, prices and coverage change every single year, just like model years in and What would you do with an extra $1,100? Because that's the average healthcare savings for people who have worked with Chapter to compare all of their Medicare plans. Chapter reviews your current coverage for free and tells you honestly whether you're in the right plan or paying too much. People who work with Chapter save an average of $1,100 on healthcare costs. That's real money back in your pocket. If your current plan is actually your best option, they'll tell you that, too. That's honest advice. Call 218-666-7429. That's 218-666-7429. Also, check out askchapter.com/carcoachreports. The link will be down below. Now, to grasp the scale of these traffic tracking cameras, here's some breaking news. FedEx has partnered with Flock Safety. The company has added automated license plate recognition and video surveillance to its operations and already works with a network of around 40,000 cameras spanning 4,000 cities across 40 states. FedEx has more than 87,000 vehicles in its express and ground fleets, and the technology is now broadly deployed across its US operations. FedEx has agreed to share its Flock surveillance feeds with law enforcement, and Flock is believed to be one of four multi-billion dollar private companies with this arrangement. This has gone far beyond street corner cameras and into corporate fleets. If you drive regularly, this network already has pieces of your movement history in more places than it did last time we covered this. The inaccuracies mean that a data error can turn a normal day into a high-stress police encounter. The expansion into retail and public spaces means records are now being created at locations where people exercise everyday rights everywhere you shop, park, and play. The Fourth Amendment protects you from unreasonable searches. That protection is being tested by rolling databases that do not require individualized suspicion to populate. The fact that the cities are swapping vendors rather than ending the practice shows the infrastructure is becoming normalized. DeFloc's mapping work is important precisely because it lets ordinary drivers see the scale in their own area and decide whether they're comfortable with it. The CEO of Flock has gone so far as to call people who report camera locations to DeFloc as terroristic. And worse than Antifa? And then unfortunately there's terroristic organizations like DeFloc whose primary motivation is chaos. They are closer to Antifa than they are anything else. And that I think is unfortunate because we don't want chaos or I don't want chaos. That kind of reaction tells you how seriously someone industry take public scrutiny. And if you want to hear more about that, you can watch my breakdown right here. This isn't about one company. It's about whether comprehensive vehicle tracking on public roads becomes a permanent background feature of driving in America with the data accessible to multiple agencies and in some cases private partners. The pushback is already producing concrete results in cities across the country. Los Angeles is letting its three-year contract with Flock expire without renewal with officials openly citing concerns over mass surveillance and collection of data on regular Americans who have done nothing wrong. Even in a deep blue city, the department is stepping away from the level of constant tracking. In Evanston, Illinois, the city not only ended its contract but ordered every Flock camera removed after a state audit found the company had been illegally sharing Illinois data with federal agencies. South Portland, Maine has already had its own cameras taken down following strong community opposition over its privacy and constitutional issues and Flock confirmed the account is closed. Westland, Michigan is removing its 10 cameras when when current contract ends at the end of the month after residents and divided city leaders raise serious concerns about data access and the technology rule in everyday policing. Other communities have taken similar steps with varying degrees of follow-through. Denver chose not to renew and move to a different provider with stricter limits on federal data sharing and shorter retention periods. Nearby Longmont and Fort Collins also dropped Flock after council reviews directed that data collection stop and cameras be removed. In Washington state, Olympia has taken its cameras offline with no replacement announced. Well, Mountlake Terrace canceled plans before any cameras were even installed. Edmonds, Washington canceled its contract and is still evaluating options. Mountain View, California ended its pilot program and shut the cameras off while it rethinks the entire policy. Austin, Texas ended its direct relationship with Flock, though police later continued accessing similar data through its partner agencies. A workaround that shows how the underlying surveillance capability can persist even when one vendor is shown out the door. So far, 86 towns and cities have canceled or declined to renew Flock contracts. That number matters because it proves the pressure works when people show up and ask direct questions. At the same time, many of these places are not walking away from automatic license plate readers entirely. They're often replacing Flock with another vendor, which means the cameras and the data collection continue but under new management. The fight isn't over just because one company loses the contract. It's about whether communities keep demanding real limits on how the data is gathered, stored, and shared, or whether they simply accept a different company running the same system. The progress so far has come from sustained local pressure. That's you. Not from hoping the technology disappears on its own, because it won't. Dozens of communities have already forced contract cancellations or removals by attending council meetings, filing records requests, and highlighting specific problems with accuracy and oversight. Your previous engagement on this topic has helped build the momentum. Don't give up now. D-FLOC gives drivers a practical next step. The app and website lets you see mapped camera locations near you and contribute new sightings. That information turns "I heard there are cameras somewhere into here are the exact poles in our town and let's talk about the contract." People are using these maps to show up prepared and ask direct questions about data retention, warrant requirements for historical searches, and whether private companies have access. Contact your local officials with specifics. Ask whether they plan to keep automatic license plate readers at all, and if so, what rules will govern verification of alerts and access to stored data. Support state-level legislation that requires warrants for historical queries and limits sharing with private entities. Back those lawsuits from people who have been wrongly stopped. These cases are already moving through the system and creating a precedence. The pattern is clear. When enough residents treat this as a local issue worth their time, contracts get reviewed and sometimes ended. D-FLOC is making it easier to see the cameras and harder for officials to claim they don't know the scale. Keep using your voice on this. The companies and agencies are adapting. The only real counter is consistent, informed pressure that treats accuracy, verification, and constitutional limits as non-negotiable. The bigger question isn't whether some crimes have been solved with this technology. It's whether we're willing to accept an always-on, error-prone record of every law-abiding driver's movements as the default condition of using public roads, and whether swapping one company for another while the database keeps growing actually solves anything, because it doesn't. The question is still open, and right now it's being decided one city contract and one map camera at a time. Don't give up. We need your support. Get out there and let them know what you think, and your voice matters.