Hundreds of cities across the US had adopted a now-familiar brand: Flock Safety surveillance systems, using controversial, AI license plate detection cameras and broad contracts with local police. Now cities, from my home of Bend, Oregon, to the LAPD in Los Angeles, are canceling their Flock contracts, while other towns are even covering Flock cameras with plastic bags while trying to figure out if the cams are actually shut down.
So, what does it mean when you spot the first camera-and-solar-panel Flock setup in your own neighborhood? I talked to Flock, the American Civil Liberties Union and others about what you need to know.
Read more: State Laws Against Surveillance and License Plate Cams
Flock made headlines late last year during widespread crackdowns by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Though Flock doesn’t have a direct partnership with federal agencies (a blurry line I’ll discuss below), law enforcement agencies are free to share data with departments like ICE, and they frequently do. And Flock Safety coverage, along with citizen concerns, has only risen since then.
One study from the Center for Human Rights at the University of Washington found that at least eight Washington law enforcement agencies shared their Flock data networks directly with ICE in 2025, and 10 more departments allowed ICE backdoor access without explicitly granting the agency permission. Many other reports outline similar activity.
Following Super Bowl ads about finding lost dogs, Flock was under scrutiny about its planned partnership with Ring, Amazon’s security brand. The integration would have allowed police to request the use of Ring-brand home security cameras for investigations. Following intense public backlash, Ring cut ties with Flock just like my city did, although it now faces a new lawsuit for its own face recognition systems.
To learn more, I spoke to Flock about how the company’s surveillance technology is used (and misused). I also spoke with privacy advocates from the ACLU to discuss surveillance concerns and what communities are doing about it.
What it means when Flock Safety sets up
Flock has expanded from cameras to drones, and with that comes greater ability to track people as well as cars.
Flock states on its website that its standard license-plate cameras cannot technically track vehicles, but only take a “point-in-time” image of a car to nab the license plate.
However, due to AI video and image search, contracted parties like local law enforcement can use these tools to piece together license information and form their own timeline of where and when a vehicle went. Adding to those capabilities, Flock also told Forbes that it’s making efforts to expand access to include video clips and live feeds.
Flock’s machine learning can also note details like a vehicle’s body type, color, the condition of the license plate and a wide variety of identifiers, like roof racks, paint colors and what you have stored in the back. Flock rarely calls this AI, but it’s similar to AI-recognition features you can find in the latest home security cameras
A Flock spokesperson told me the company has boundaries and does not use facial recognition: “We have more traditional video cameras that can send an alert when one sees if a person is in the frame, for instance, in a business park at 2 a.m. or in the public parks after dark.”
By “traditional” cameras, Flock refers to those that capture a wider field of view — more than just cars and license plates — and can record video rather than just snapshot images.
The information Flock can access provides a comprehensive picture that police can use to track cars by running searches on their software. Just like you might Google a local restaurant, police can search for a basic vehicle description and retrieve recent matches that the surveillance equipment may have found. Those searches can sometimes extend to people, too.
“We have an investigative tool called Freeform that lets you use natural language prompts to find the investigative lead you’re looking for, including the description of what a person’s clothes may be,” the Flock spokesperson told me.
Unlike red-light cameras, Flock’s cameras can be installed nearly anywhere and snap vehicle ID images for all cars. There are Safe Lists that people can use to help Flock cameras filter out vehicles by filling out a form with their address and license plate to mark their vehicle as a “resident.”
The opposite is also true: Flock cameras can use a hot list of known, wanted vehicles and send automatic alerts to police if one is found.
With Flock drones, these intelligent searches become even more complete, allowing cameras to track where cars are going and identify people. That raises additional privacy concerns about having eyes in the sky over your backyard.
“While flying, the drone faces forward, looking at the horizon, until it gets to the call for service, at which point the camera looks down,” the Flock spokesperson said. “Every flight path is logged in a publicly available flight dashboard for appropriate oversight.”
Yet unlike personal security options, there’s no easy way to opt out of this kind of surveillance. You can’t turn off a feature, cancel a subscription or throw away a device to avoid it.
And even though more than 45 cities have canceled Flock contracts amid public outcry, that doesn’t guarantee that all surveillance cameras will be removed from the designated area.
When I reached out to the police department in Eugene, another city in Oregon that ended its Flock contract, the PD director of public information told me that, while there were concerns about certain vulnerabilities and data security requirements with the particular vendor, the technology itself is not the problem. “Eugene Police’s ALPR system experience has demonstrated the value of leveraging ALPR technology to aid investigations … the department must ensure that any vendors meet the highest standards.”
Does Flock track personal information? The devil is in the details
Flock’s security practices are solid, but it’s the company’s users I’m worried about.
Flock states on its website that it stores data for 30 days on Amazon Web Services cloud storage and then deletes it. It uses KMS-based encryption (a managed encryption key system common in AWS) and reports that all images and related data are encrypted from on-device storage to cloud storage.
When Flock collects criminal justice information, or sensitive data managed by law enforcement, it’s only available to official government agencies, not an entity like your local HOA. Because video data is encrypted throughout its transfer to the end user, employees at Flock cannot access it. These are the same kind of security practices I look for when reviewing home security cameras, but there are more complications here.
However, Flock also makes it clear that its customers — whether that’s a local police department, private business or another institution — own their data and control access to it. Once end users access that data, Flock’s own privacy measures don’t do much to help. That raises concerns about the security of local law enforcement systems, each of which has its own data regulations and accountability practices.
Abuse of Flock data
While ICE can’t directly access Flock’s system, they tend to get a lot of help from local law enforcement.
ICE is the elephant in the room in my Flock guide. Does Flock share its surveillance data with federal agencies such as ICE? Yes, the federal government frequently has access to that data, but how it gets access is important.
Flock states on its website that it has not shared data or partnered with ICE or any other Department of Homeland Security officials since terminating its pilot programs in August 2025. Flock says its focus is now on local law enforcement, but that comes with a hands-off approach that doesn’t control what happens to information downstream.
“Flock has no authority to share data on our customers’ behalf, nor the authority to disrupt their law enforcement operations,” the Flock spokesperson told me. “Local police all over the country collaborate with federal agencies for various reasons, with or without Flock technology. “
That collaboration has grown more complex. As Sen. Ron Wyden, a Democrat from Oregon, stated in an open letter to Flock Safety, “local” law enforcement isn’t that local anymore, especially when 75% of Flock’s law enforcement customers have enrolled in the National Lookup Tool, which allows information sharing across the country between all participants.
“Flock has built a dangerous platform in which abuse of surveillance data is almost certain,” Wyden wrote. “The company has adopted a see-no-evil approach of not proactively auditing the searches done by its law enforcement customers because, as the company’s Chief Communications Officer told the press, ‘It is not Flock’s job to police the police.'”
Police department sharing isn’t always easy to track, but 404 Media reported last year that police departments across the country have been creating Flock searches with reasons listed as “immigration,” “ICE,” or “ICE warrant,” among others. Again, since police can put whatever terms they want in these fields — depending on local policies — we don’t know for sure how common it is to look up info for ICE.
Additionally, there’s not always an official process or chain of accountability for sharing this data. In Oregon, reports found that a police department was conducting Flock searches on behalf of ICE and the FBI via a simple email thread.
“When this kind of surveillance power is in malevolent hands — and in the case of ICE, I feel comfortable saying a growing number of Americans view it as a bad actor — these companies are empowering actions the public increasingly finds objectionable,” a lawyer with the ACLU told a Salt Lake City news outlet earlier this year.
With the myriad ways law enforcement shares Flock data with the federal government, it may seem like there’s not much you can do. But one powerful tool is advocating for new laws.
The rise of laws limiting what Flock Safety and police can do
Many other AI surveillance tools are appearing, including some aimed at law enforcement and businesses.
Marlow acknowledged that individuals can’t do much about Flock surveillance without bans or legislation.
“Flock identifies and tracks your vehicle by scanning its license plate, and covering your license plate is illegal, so that is not an option,” he told me.
However, Marlow suggested minor changes that could make a difference for those who are seriously worried. “When people are traveling to sensitive locations, they could take public transportation and pay with cash (credit cards can be tracked, as can share-a-rides) or get a lift from a friend, but those aren’t really practical on an everyday basis.”
Ditching or restricting Flock Safety is one way communities are fighting back against what they consider to be unnecessary surveillance with the potential for abuse. But AI surveillance doesn’t begin or end with one company.
If you want to take an extra step, you can volunteer, donate and participate in a variety of anti-surveillance activities.
The first step is being aware, including knowing which new cameras your city is installing and which software partnerships your local law enforcement has. If you don’t like what you discover, find ways to participate in the decision-making process, like attending open city council meetings on Flock, as in Bend.
On a broader level, keep track of the legislation your state is considering regarding Flock and similar surveillance contracts and operations, as these will have the greatest long-term impact. Blocking data from being shared out of state and requiring police to delete surveillance ASAP are particularly important steps. You can contact your state senators and representatives to encourage legislation like this.
When you’re wondering what to share with politicians, I recommend something like what Marlow told me: “The idea of keeping a location dossier on every single person just in case one of us turns out to be a criminal is just about the most un-American approach to privacy I can imagine.”
You can also sign up for and donate to projects that are addressing Flock concerns, such as The Plate Privacy Project from The Institute for Justice. I’m currently talking to them about the latest events, and I’ll update if they have any additional tips for us.
Keep following CNET home security, where I break down the latest news you should know, like privacy settings to turn on, security camera settings you may want to turn off and how surveillance intersects with our daily lives. Things are changing fast, but we’re staying on top of it.
