Flock Safety is highlighting cases in which its automated license plate readers have helped law enforcement find missing children and identify suspects. But as the company’s camera network expands across the country, critics are asking whether a tool designed to improve public safety is also creating an unprecedented system for tracking Americans’ movements.
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From The Daily Caller:
Flock Safety is touting emotional stories about automatic license plate readers (ALPRs) helping rescue children as concerns about the dangers of mass surveillance grow.
Rahul Sidhu, Flock’s chief strategy officer, posted a video on X Tuesday featuring moving clips of police rescuing missing children.
The video begins with 911 audio of a distraught woman telling the operator that her son had been kidnapped. It also includes clips that purport to show law enforcement rescuing a six-year-old nonverbal boy, finding a 14-month-old baby, and saving a two-year-old boy who asks, “Where’s my mom?”
Flock Safety has grown into a major provider of automated license plate reader technology used by law enforcement agencies around the country. Its cameras capture passing vehicles and can identify characteristics beyond a license plate, including a vehicle’s make, model, bumper stickers, bike racks, dents, and scratches. That information can then be used to create what the company calls a “Vehicle Fingerprint.”
The technology can provide investigators with valuable information quickly. Flock CEO Garrett Langley recently said that in a single day the company’s cameras generated alerts involving thousands of registered sex offenders, stolen vehicles and wanted individuals, as well as 158 missing people or children. Flock says searches of its system are logged, require justification, and can be audited.
But the scale of the network has prompted concerns about how much information is being collected on people who are not suspected of crimes. Because cameras routinely photograph vehicles as they travel through communities, information about ordinary drivers can become part of a searchable database available to participating law enforcement agencies.
Those concerns are now being tested in court. Kansas resident Mason Grimmett, represented by the Kansas Justice Institute, has sued the city of Wichita over its use of the cameras. His lawsuit alleges the system enables authorities to continuously track and compile information about law-abiding residents without obtaining warrants or establishing probable cause or reasonable suspicion.
Previous cases involving law enforcement officers have added urgency to the debate over safeguards. Former Kansas police chief Lee Nygaard reportedly acknowledged using the Flock system repeatedly to locate vehicles associated with his former girlfriend and her boyfriend. In another case, former Kansas police officer Victor Heiar was convicted of computer crime and stalking after using the database to track his estranged wife.
Political opposition is also growing. Knox County Mayor Glenn Jacobs, a Republican, has warned that increasingly sophisticated artificial intelligence, networking, and data-retention capabilities could turn license plate readers into a “warrantless mass surveillance system.” Rep. Tim Burchett, R-Tenn., meanwhile, has drafted legislation intended to place restrictions on the government’s use of surveillance technology.
The constitutional questions surrounding this technology are likely to become more important as artificial intelligence makes it possible to collect, connect, and search enormous amounts of information. License plate readers can undoubtedly assist law enforcement in finding kidnapped children, recovering stolen vehicles, and locating dangerous suspects. The question is whether government can reap those benefits without creating the infrastructure to monitor innocent Americans on a massive scale.
Scripture recognizes government’s legitimate responsibility to restrain wrongdoing and protect the innocent, but Americans also enjoy constitutional protections intended to restrain government itself. As surveillance technology becomes increasingly powerful, let’s pray that our leaders have wisdom to protect both public safety and the liberties that distinguish a free society.
What do you think of Flock cameras? Share your thoughts and prayers below.
(Excerpt from The Daily Caller)
