The United States has long been a nation caught between two extremes: not wanting to be monitored 24/7 and totally fine with near-constant surveillance. The pro-surveillance state folks don’t have to do much to assure their world into being. They just have to sit back and let a mixture of fear and corporate influence take over. The anti-surveillance folks take matters into their own hands, like smashing Flock cameras whenever they pop up in a new city.
The pattern was documented by journalist Brian Merchant in his newsletter Blood in the Machine. Brian has tracked a growing, seemingly uncoordinated campaign against the company’s networked license plate readers and AI-powered monitoring systems. People are not taking kindly to the creeping surveillance state, as evidenced by all the smashed Flock cameras folks are leaving in their wake.
In a small city just outside of San Diego, two Flock cameras were recently destroyed weeks after city officials voted to extend their contract despite vocal public opposition. Similar incidents have been reported in two Oregon towns, Eugene and Springfield, where at least six cameras were cut down last year.
In Suffolk, Virginia, 41-year-old Jefferey S. Sovern was arrested after allegedly wrecking 13 cameras, claiming it was an act of defense of his Fourth Amendment privacy rights.
The Growing Revolt Against Flock’s Surveillance Cameras
Flock is valued at $7.5 billion and is active in around 6,000 communities in the United States. Its bread-and-butter surveillance moneymaker is automatic license plate readers, which collect vehicle data that can be stored and accessed without a warrant. Critics argue that is a tactic that exists in a constitutional gray area.
The data has reportedly been accessed by federal agencies such as ICE, sometimes without local authorities being notified. In one case out of Georgia, a police chief was charged with using Flock data to stalk private citizens.
Unease and flat-out hatred of the company have spread across the country, with rage intensifying after Ring briefly partnered with Flock, a backlash that was a little too intense for Ring. After all, Ring is a company trying to position itself as a ‘kinder, softer version of mass surveillance.’ Ring quickly ended its relationship with Flock.
If you don’t have a taste for destruction and simply want to be made aware of the presence of a Flock camera to avoid a certain area, you can use the activist site DeFlock, which uses your location data to track Flock cameras in your area.
Municipalities across the country keep signing contracts with Flock while seemingly plugging their ears and humming to block out the rather vocal objections from citizens. It’s ultimately another case of politicians choosing surveillance-state policing over the will of the people.
As long as I keep happening, as long as those cameras keep going up, there will always be everyday people who become so radicalized by the mere presence of these cameras that they feel it’s their duty to bring them down.
The post Why People Won’t Stop Destroying Flock Surveillance Cameras appeared first on VICE.
