The Surveillance Shell Game: Why Ditching Flock Doesn't End Mass Tracking

Dozens of cities are dumping Flock Safety's automated license plate readers. Good. But here's the catch: they're not dumping the surveillance itself. They're just switching vendors.

According to NPR's reporting, more than 130,000 ALPR cameras are already scattered across American cities. Flock took the heat because its CEO was loud about it on social media and because the company built a shared national database that lets any police department search footage from cameras anywhere in the country. That visibility sparked backlash. But Axon, Motorola Solutions, and Verkada offer the same core technology, and they've largely stayed out of the spotlight.

This matters because the problem isn't Flock. The problem is a surveillance infrastructure that captures images of millions of innocent people every day, stores them in searchable databases, and operates with almost no federal oversight.

Why This Connects to the Common Good

The U.S. is the only major democracy without a federal privacy law. That's not an accident, it's the result of decades of tech and law enforcement lobbying. Meanwhile, a $323 billion data broker industry extracts Americans' lives for profit, and police agencies have essentially unlimited power to track vehicles, search records across jurisdictions, and share that data with whoever they want.

Add in minimal police training compared to other developed nations, and you get a system where officers with 20 weeks of training can access surveillance networks that reveal where people go, when they go there, and who they're with. That's a recipe for discriminatory policing, harassment, and the chilling of legitimate speech and assembly.

The real issue isn't whether Flock or Axon sells the cameras. It's that we built a mass surveillance state without ever asking citizens if they wanted it.

What Needs to Change

Simply banning one vendor won't fix this. You need federal privacy law with real teeth, data minimization requirements that say police can only collect information directly relevant to a specific investigation, not bulk surveillance. You need warrant requirements before searching national databases. You need transparency about where cameras are, how they're used, and what happens to the footage.

You also need police who are trained to handle power responsibly. The U.S. trains officers in 20 weeks. Germany requires 2.5 years. Japan, with stricter accountability, kills 170 times fewer civilians per capita. Better-trained cops use force less often and make better judgment calls about when surveillance is actually justified versus when it's just convenient.

And you need to end qualified immunity, the legal shield that lets officers and agencies avoid consequences when they abuse these tools. Right now, even if police violate your privacy rights, suing them is almost impossible.