Cops Are Using Flock to Spy on People for the Crime of Standing Around

Key Points:

• Flock Security operates a national network of over 120,000 cameras and license plate scanners, promoted by its executives and investors as a tool for preventing serious crimes like child abduction and rape.
• However, police agencies are also using Flock’s technology to investigate minor offenses such as curfew violations, loitering, and homelessness, categorizing these under “Curfew/Loitering/Vagrancy Violations.”
• Records from Plano, Illinois, show over 1,200 searches related to these minor offenses, with many queries coming from departments across multiple states and involving extensive surveillance of vehicles and pedestrians.
• Critics, including civil liberties experts, warn that this represents mission creep and over-policing, with concerns that loitering and vagrancy laws have historically been used to target marginalized groups and that oversight of Flock’s use is minimal and largely self-regulated.
• The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation and other agencies have used Flock data for broad surveillance, including monitoring protests and homeless individuals, raising further privacy and civil rights concerns.