Gardner police discontinue Flock cameras as license plate readers face scrutiny

arkhiver

They will just switch to Axon

e2le

Isn't it a bit disingenuous to refer to them as merely license plate readers?

aussieguy1234

There are multiple cases of people being falsely imprisoned because police believed Flock over actual evidence. In each case Flock was wrong.

atmavatar

"Over 1,200 vendors had access to our information through the Flock system," Steinmetz said, adding he did not know the identities of all those entities. Even if for some strange reason you're OK with the police having access to the surveillance data (despite multiple recent articles revealing abuse), I'd like to think most people would take issue with random third parties also having access to it. Flock cameras and their ilk are not OK in a civilized, free society.

neom

"Authorities have charged or accused at least 50 law-enforcement officers of using license-plate readers for unauthorized purposes, including to stalk women without their knowledge or consent, a Post analysis of police and court records found. In 26 of these cases, police investigators and prosecutors said the officers used the technology to spy on their wives, their girlfriends, their exes, their exes’ new partners or women they wanted to meet." https://archive.is/fxZWT And 3 more just a week ago in Georgia: https://www.cbsnews.com/atlanta/news/3-georgia-deputies-arre... If you're curious how this plays out in practice, investigation room video of an officer who confesses to using one to create an alert on a woman so he could pull her over later to get her instagram: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I3UfAMzz9Lc

s1artibartfast

Unfortunate that so many people come at this with a black and white perspective. Cameras like Flock have obvious value and use cases. They also have obvious misuse cases. The obvious solution is to adopt and regulate the technology so that I can be used in the way is that the public wants that allows reasonable privacy.

sneak

* Flock (YC S17) https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/flock-safety

throwitaway222

Maybe we need to upgrade the system to be more like... To use this service copy and paste your authorization: 634534534535453454565646567880123843489579823374234 Thank you! Your authorization gives you permission to search for plate 5VFA213 only. Signed by Judge Ja.... The problem isn't flock either. The next system that replaces this is going to be self-charging and swapping out Drones that scan large areas 15 feet above traffic and follow people it hasn't seen on a daily basis (non-normal events). Good luck us.

jmpman

I've been thinking about this for a while. The only place I want flock cameras is at the entrances of the mall parking lot. I can't articulate why that seems acceptable, and yet I view everywhere else as an overstep.