Flock was pitched as the triumph of technology over criminality. It's surveillance network was supposed to end crime. However, when people witness extreme criminality thriving unpunished at the top levels of U.S. politics, the lie becomes evident. Flock isn't about ending crime. It's a tool of control to be used by criminals.
It's a nice idea. Everything is backwards right now. It should to be the other way around: random citizens should be essentially anonymous while all members of the government are surveilled 24/7. Surveillance should scale with power.
This is a perspective I hadn’t heard or considered before.
Often times common crime (petty/violent) is viewed as a totally different area as white-collar crime or corruption. But they’re related.
As someone who’s had bikes stolen and car broken into, I sympathize with the desire for surveillance (especially in San Francisco). But Flock has no safeguards against cops using it to stalk ex-wives or misusing a partial match.
Passed an old guy sitting on the side of the road with a lawn chair today, he was holding a pool skimmer with cardboard attached at the end to block a flock camera. There was a local news story about it [1]. Happy to see it.
Despite differences in political beliefs you probably have more in common with this man than any of the politicians that claim to care about your or your values.
I had this thought just the other day. It is not possible for any governing body to completely ignore the governed unless the governed have no issues that that lead to speach/action. There will always be a petition/revolt/exodus which results in the governing body hearing the governed.
> the governed unless the governed have no issues that that lead to speach/action
What about if the speech is censored, shadow-banned, limited etc in some other ways? Where the governed does not know their speech was limited in reach, censored etc? (which btw is a real approach social media companies are taking today).
... or infighting, or self-destruction, or doomscrolling... the pressure will go somewhere but not necessarily into channels that relieve it. That takes more effort and persistence, and also a society (our consumer societies hardly rate as such in my books).
the right to free speech has nothing to do with what social media companies do. Social media companies are not compelled by anything, in law or otherwise, to amplify your particular post.
I think I may have a minority view about surveillance. At least I need someone to explain something to me.
Is the backlash really about privacy, or is the real problem a complete lack of trust in government?
Because if I thought someone would actually use the cameras to enforce the law, that's not actually such a bad outcome. You aren't supposed to speed, you aren't supposed to let your dog poop without cleaning up after it, and there's a bunch of other offences as well.
Why would I not support a hypothetical police that enforced these rules? Guy takes his dog for a walk, doesn't pick up, boom, cameras plus AI finds the person and issues a fine. Enforcing a social norm, cheaply. There seems to be evidence that it works with speeding: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2025/04/250402181306.h...
The kind of story that I've actually come across is that someone with access to the public database abuses it. They peek into their ex girlfriend's records, that kind of thing. Obviously nobody thinks that's ok, and I can understand if the main pushback people have is that none of the first thing will happen and lots of the second thing will happen. But that doesn't seem to address the principle itself.
So what exactly is the argument for why we shouldn't have cameras catching people who break the law? Presumably we would have no issue with a cop seeing someone breaking the law, and enforcing. The issue comes up when we replace the policeman with a system that is always on and way cheaper to run than a cop.
Real world results are poor. I've gotten a ticket for not coming to a "full and complete stop" at an empty intersection at 2AM. I drove up to the corner extremely slowly instead. A $500 fine.
That tends to be people's experience with this sort of thing. Laws the police generally wouldn't bother enforcing are maximally enforced, because it generates revenue.
They got rid of that camera eventually because it was "too easy for people to get out of tickets", meaning they were getting tossed when people challenged them.
1. If someone is running to a cop because someone didn’t pick up after their dog, that is a sad state of affairs.
2. If we are so interested in enforcing laws, what about all of the white collar crime, crypto scams, insider trading, and grifting off of the public sector? Clearly doing more harm to society than some dog poop. Where are the $8bn market cap companies that go around enforcing securities laws?
I think it should depend on what residents living in the street want with several tiers. Public cam, paywall, law enforcement 24/7 or for a specific case, encrypted court order only, fake cams.
Each with different aproval requirements. A public cam would require 100%. Fake cams req only one vote. etc
Lets instead talk about the growing vigalante action by Flock corporation refusing to allow cities to remove cameras from their property after the contract is cancelled. Some cities have been forced to cover the cameras with trash bags.
Local politicians need to coordinate to remove their Flock cameras at the same time and pass laws to prevent any new one from being put up. Flock doesn't have the resources to sue every single one of them, especially if every city commits to dragging out the process for as long as possible by creating as many legal hurdles as they can, all of which Flock would have to have a court rule on.
Kind of like how practically every Scientologist filed suit against the IRS over CoS having their tax exempt status revoked, to which the IRS eventually relented.
It's also wild to me we live in a country where people who _live_ in a region are not allowed to make decisions about something as foul as surveillance cameras. If people who live, work, and are affected by these don't want them that should be the end of the conversation.
It should be to the people who live in an area to make decisions about it. With the legal ability to tell a company like Flock to fuck off.
Congratulations, Flock, on establishing the most successful honeypot of all time!
No matter what the level of corruption, no matter which side of the surveillance state you support, no matter which side of the cameras you're on, Flock has a way to shine a spotlight on you and bring you out of the closet!
Currently following a YouTuber who knows all the roadside regulations for signposts and he points out how the Flock poles are all installed dangerously wrong, and will surely impale the next driver to crash out on the shoulder!
>No Federal agency may purchase, deploy, operate, access, or contract for any automated surveillance system that identifies, tracks, or records individuals [. . .]
Emphasis mine.
Am I wrong or does this 1. not outlaw the purchase of the data, just the systems themselves, 2. not outlaw the use of the data unless it was obtained by the federal government through a system they have purchased, and 3. not outlaw local or state law enforcement from buying it, just outlaws the use of federal funds to buy these systems.
So flock feed the data through brokers instead of directly, correct? Or am I reading this wrong?
AFAICT, municipalities get paid to put up the cameras, which isn't federal, so flock can then use those cameras to freely gather data and sell it to police
> municipalities get paid to put up the cameras
I've read lots of FOIAd flock contracts, and I have yet to see any municipality get paid by flock - they pay flock per-camera. Is that just a hunch, or are there cases of towns getting money from flock?
Who watches the watchers? Everyone.
Often times common crime (petty/violent) is viewed as a totally different area as white-collar crime or corruption. But they’re related.
As someone who’s had bikes stolen and car broken into, I sympathize with the desire for surveillance (especially in San Francisco). But Flock has no safeguards against cops using it to stalk ex-wives or misusing a partial match.
But it's clear that increased surveillance hasn't been leading to stolen property being recovered.
[1] https://www.cltampa.com/news/a-77-year-old-republican-man-is...
One could even argue communicating over the phone or internet lacks the destructive component. Irl behavior is heavily modified by it.
Verbal communication is a work in progress. We really want it to work. Sometimes you have to make people listen. Get them back in the program :)
Except that animals don't have knives, guns, bombs and nuclear warheads.
> Sometimes you have to make people listen. Get them back in the program :)
Works great until you're the one being made to listen.
Yeah, animals will spill your intestines out on the ground and start eating you asshole first while you scream.
And they may even do it for fun and not even eat you, and just let your fleshy bits rot in the sun.
Physical action is inevitable if the speech isn't listened to.
see also: "The Four boxes of liberty"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_boxes_of_liberty
What about if the speech is censored, shadow-banned, limited etc in some other ways? Where the governed does not know their speech was limited in reach, censored etc? (which btw is a real approach social media companies are taking today).
Is the backlash really about privacy, or is the real problem a complete lack of trust in government?
Because if I thought someone would actually use the cameras to enforce the law, that's not actually such a bad outcome. You aren't supposed to speed, you aren't supposed to let your dog poop without cleaning up after it, and there's a bunch of other offences as well.
Why would I not support a hypothetical police that enforced these rules? Guy takes his dog for a walk, doesn't pick up, boom, cameras plus AI finds the person and issues a fine. Enforcing a social norm, cheaply. There seems to be evidence that it works with speeding: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2025/04/250402181306.h...
The kind of story that I've actually come across is that someone with access to the public database abuses it. They peek into their ex girlfriend's records, that kind of thing. Obviously nobody thinks that's ok, and I can understand if the main pushback people have is that none of the first thing will happen and lots of the second thing will happen. But that doesn't seem to address the principle itself.
So what exactly is the argument for why we shouldn't have cameras catching people who break the law? Presumably we would have no issue with a cop seeing someone breaking the law, and enforcing. The issue comes up when we replace the policeman with a system that is always on and way cheaper to run than a cop.
That tends to be people's experience with this sort of thing. Laws the police generally wouldn't bother enforcing are maximally enforced, because it generates revenue.
They got rid of that camera eventually because it was "too easy for people to get out of tickets", meaning they were getting tossed when people challenged them.
2. If we are so interested in enforcing laws, what about all of the white collar crime, crypto scams, insider trading, and grifting off of the public sector? Clearly doing more harm to society than some dog poop. Where are the $8bn market cap companies that go around enforcing securities laws?
Each with different aproval requirements. A public cam would require 100%. Fake cams req only one vote. etc
https://www.404media.co/flock-objects-to-our-removing-their-...
https://www.wmtv15news.com/2026/06/05/dane-county-covers-flo...
Kind of like how practically every Scientologist filed suit against the IRS over CoS having their tax exempt status revoked, to which the IRS eventually relented.
It should be to the people who live in an area to make decisions about it. With the legal ability to tell a company like Flock to fuck off.
No matter what the level of corruption, no matter which side of the surveillance state you support, no matter which side of the cameras you're on, Flock has a way to shine a spotlight on you and bring you out of the closet!
Currently following a YouTuber who knows all the roadside regulations for signposts and he points out how the Flock poles are all installed dangerously wrong, and will surely impale the next driver to crash out on the shoulder!
[0] https://youtube.com/@theguardrailguy
H.R.9800 - Protection Against Mass Surveillance Act - https://www.congress.gov/bill/119th-congress/house-bill/9800...
>No Federal agency may purchase, deploy, operate, access, or contract for any automated surveillance system that identifies, tracks, or records individuals [. . .]
Emphasis mine.
Am I wrong or does this 1. not outlaw the purchase of the data, just the systems themselves, 2. not outlaw the use of the data unless it was obtained by the federal government through a system they have purchased, and 3. not outlaw local or state law enforcement from buying it, just outlaws the use of federal funds to buy these systems.
So flock feed the data through brokers instead of directly, correct? Or am I reading this wrong?