Flock Cameras Should Scare You

I like to consider myself a well-informed person. I have to work at it, but I try to keep up on a lot of the issues that we are faced with these days. I have seen several articles about Flock cameras. But I really didn't know too much about the surveillance systems. The company markets them essentially as red light cameras. The kind that can record your vehicle's license plate number if you run a red light and then send you a ticket in the mail. I finally had some time to look into them and what they truly are should scare you as much as anything else.

Flark says they have sold about 128,000 cameras with the accompanying software. Their primary customers are not only law enforcement but homeowners' associations, security companies, and businesses. The system is powered by artificial intelligence programming that makes it very easy to do searches.

Elk Grove Wisconsin is a small town near Milwaukee with a population of about 6500 people. Sometime last year their Police Department installed six of the cameras. What they found out, after doing a search for a vehicle that had run a red light in their town but gone on to the next municipality, was that once they do a search outside of their jurisdiction, everyone else that has a Flock account can access all of their data. Before they knew it, they were getting 1 million views a month.

The most frequent viewer of Elk Grove's videos was the California Highway Patrol. Not particularly because they were assisting the Police Department with investigations but because as the Flock company puts it, viewing videos from around the country can be quite addictive. It can also be abused. Effectively it's no different than social media like Instagram or TikTok.

Flock's data shows that the California Highway Patrol conducts about 50,000 out of district searches a month, followed by the FBI that does about 20,000 searches a month. The Louisville Police Department is close behind at about 17,000 searches. You might understand a few searches if they were looking for a vehicle or maybe a suspect, but to conduct that many indicates the system might be abused.

One of the things about the surveillance system is that the cameras are very advanced with optics that are comparable to what is used by the US military in spy planes or satellites. They can produce extremely clear pictures and videos, well beyond what we have been used to seeing in banks when there is a robbery. In fact, the company claims that it can create the equivalent of a fingerprint for every vehicle that is recorded. Dents, scratches, bumper stickers, and other unique identifying information can be seen clearly and recorded for use later. The AI program can do a search of all jurisdictions and find a specific car based simply upon its fingerprint. If they can do that with a vehicle, imagine what they can do with facial recognition technology, which is something they are doing.

Here are searches that have been done using the Flock system.

• Indianapolis Police ran 70 nationwide searches to monitor who attended the funeral of rapper "Lil E." Then followed them as they traveled across the country.
• Hanover County, N.C., Police ran 385 nationwide searches for a "K9 investigation."
• Lexington, Ohio, Police ran 225 nationwide searches to catch someone "attempting to sell homemade fireworks."
• Panama City Police ran four nationwide searches to find "stolen funeral home gurneys."
• Lucas County, Ohio, Police ran over 500 searches for an "illegal casino."
• Harrison County sheriff's deputies in Texas did a nationwide search for a stolen lawn mower.
•A Sheriff's Department in Illinois did a nationwide search for stolen hospital gurneys.

The gray area is the legality of these searches. There has been some litigation regarding Google's geofencing software and cameras. But the need for a warrant has not been clearly decided. Most agencies argue that people are in public and have no right to an expectation of privacy. Flock Users must enter a reason for conducting a search, but it doesn't really mean anything. The company's data shows that the most often given reason for conducting a search outside of someone's jurisdiction is simply "investigation."

A couple of years ago I began talking about the concept of the 15-minute city that is being pushed by many liberal politicians. The idea being that you will live in a neighborhood where everything you want or need is within a 15-minute walk. You will be required to stay in your zone with very few legitimate reasons to leave. This technology would make it very simple for Big Brother to track you. The software program can also record where you go, who you were with, all purchases you made, and even predict your future movements and interactions with others. According to the company, the AI program is about 65 to 70% accurate on predicting your future actions. Doesn't that sound like the Tom Cruise movie where he got arrested for simply thinking about killing someone?

I now understand why so many people are destroying and vandalizing the cameras. There are no guardrails on this system. Once you purchase a camera and pay for the software, you have access to anything you want in any system around the world. If I have to tell you about the endless possibilities for abuse, you are part of the problem.