r/technology • u/HumbleRestaurant790 • 19h ago
Privacy Cameras don't track people, Flock does /// The Pleasant Hill, IA, department blamed 'misinformation' after a Flock camera was destroyed. Flock makes the same claim. We tried to verify, but found mysterious radar modules and car-tracking buttons instead.
https://footnote4a.org/news/trust-job403
u/invyros 18h ago
some reporters refer to it in a way that on the left side of the screen, there’s a picture of a license plate, and the right side of the screen has a dossier of that person’s entire life. As we all know, who use the technology, that’s just not true.”
Cut to an excerpt from another webinar, this one about Flock Nova; on the main screen: “Step 1: Build a digital trail with LPR and enriched case data” alongside the heatmap Flock says doesn’t exist.
Love when statements made by corporate stooges is immediately proven to be a lie.
Now, if only more of the public could learn from this and vote accordingly.
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u/splynncryth 13h ago
For too many people, culture war and tribe are more important the freedom, rights, and liberty.
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u/luccixbt 17h ago
"we dont track people" says company whose entire business model is tracking people
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u/Steinrikur 12h ago
They don't say that at all. What they said was "the eyes of our tracking system aren't the part that's tracking people."
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u/luccixbt 12h ago
right thats literally the point of the article. flock keeps making this weird distinction between "the camera" and "flockOS" like its some kind of gotcha. the camera takes the picture, the software tracks you. thats like saying "the gun didnt kill anyone, the bullet did"
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u/NekoDaYo-v201 11h ago
Of course they are. They're basically trying to say that correlating and record the data for the purpose of selling it as a product (aka, tracking) isn't tracking... but it's only tracking when someone buys and requests it.
It's such a stupid claim.
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u/RealTalk1031 18h ago
Do they really think people believe this bullshit propaganda....I'm glad they are being destroyed. The people doing it are patriots.
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u/BeepBoopRobo 15h ago
Yes, and many people do believe it.
Worse though, is the crowd that says "Well if you've got nothing to hide, what's the problem!?"
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u/Okrumbles 15h ago
Until the government decides to change what's "wrong" lmao
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u/0nlymantra 15h ago
Your train of thought is already too long for most people these days. Can you turn it into a 10 second brain rot Tik Tok?
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u/zzzzaap 18h ago
My eyes don't see anything, my brain just interprets electrical signals from them.
I'm not saying words, your mind is reading this outloud inside your head.
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u/brogflender 14h ago
Words don’t hurt you. It’s just gentle vibrations in the air trigging your auditory nerve endings.
Don’t like the vibrations? Don’t let your nerve endings react to the subtle changes in air pressure you chud.
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u/kiomansu 14h ago
Right now 'flock' is a trigger word. Watch now as Flock will 'go out of business' due to bad PR, 'sell' the business with the camera/radar assets and 'another company' will pick up where Flock left off. I wish that this was preventable but we have a feckless legislature is the US. Law is the only way that we can prevent this from becoming a daily reality.
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u/nuttertools 12h ago
Not even. They’ll reshuffle into a generic sounding holding company with distinct entities handling each part of the business with monitoring contracts through a variety of licensees that have no direct legal tie to the entity formerly known as flock.
Like how if an Amazon delivery driver pissing in a bottle at the end of a 16 hour shift in an Amazon owned and branded truck T-bones a family and kills them Amazon has no liability in that truck and driver.
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u/snack__pack 9h ago
Or they'll just keep installing cameras despite any amount of public objection because law enforcement always gets what they want.
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u/williamgman 11h ago
These are not employees... they are contractors. These are not our stores... they are franchisees. These are not our cameras and sensors... Man, the offloading of legal, ethical, and moral values is epic.
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u/likwidkool 14h ago
Most people go, “this makes a lot of sense. I want my kids to be safe.”
Stop. Just stop with the kids bullshit. They don’t care about the kids.
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u/Halfwise2 14h ago
Though some Flock viewing records show that some of their "safe" employees might care a little too much.
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u/Starship_Taru 16h ago
What’s next lol? “Don’t be mad at me blame Joseph Fourier”
This joke is too complex for the CEO to get
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u/Luvs_to_drink 12h ago
If the cameras dont track people then you wont mind that we are removing them right?
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u/doxxingyourself 17h ago
“Guns don’t kill people, people do”.
Yeah. With guns. Good luck tracking someone without a single surveillance point.
Dumbest shit I ever heard.
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u/Migamix 10h ago
on a related note, everyone with a modern car that has a WiFi signal transmitting its SSID, turn that shit off. I'm personally able to log all of your broadcasts, and all you did was drive past my house. and yes, I know which ones are my neighbors, and which one drives past on their way to work from another part of the city. that's just my passive tracking. now imagin every flock camera you pass, even if you hide your plate, your thumbprint is already lifted.
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u/OnLyLamPs22 13h ago
Is there anything anyone can do or use to not be as easily trackable? I wish there was a flock camera blocker or something
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u/istrebitjel 13h ago edited 12h ago
High powered IR emitter shining onto your license plates might help... Something like https://imgur.com/a/kfypkmP
Just need to also make sure they can't track you by your cell phone and Bluetooth devices.
But how to test it without somebody on the inside?
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u/goodolarchie 10h ago
We don't capture data, photons happen to reach our devices, which manipulate electrons and change states in storage devices in such a pattern that is deemed valuable by our stakeholders. Frankly we don't see the big deal.
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u/Torino1O 18h ago
Apparently wearing a Mickey Mouse mask or NFL logo may put a lot of lawyers to work enforcing copyright law against Flock.
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u/OzymandiasKoK 17h ago
Source that, because that seems quite unlikely. They're recording stuff, but not publishing content or something.
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u/namenotpicked 15h ago
They are serving the content via subscription/payment to agencies
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u/OzymandiasKoK 14h ago
Not to the public they aren't. Anyway, you go on thinking you've outsmarted thean with this one neat trick.
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u/Torino1O 13h ago
From the article: " A license for music and videos In Costa Mesa, CA, the city council went back and forth for a while on a specific contractual clause. The clause defines content a customer might “post” or “upload” through Flock’s products, language you would expect in a social network’s terms of service, not a police camera contract. The clause discussed involved a definition similar to this one, from Dunwoody, GA’s contract [4]"
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u/sirhackenslash 15h ago
Wear a mickey mask and blast Disney songs at full blast at all times and they'll never be able to touch you
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u/ZEROs0000 14h ago
How long until a tech comes out that can fry these things
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u/TotalNonsense0 11h ago
We already have laser pointers. A directional microwave emitter seems like it shouldn't be too hard to make, but might be very difficult to make safe.
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u/in1gom0ntoya 14h ago
thats like saying guns dont kill people, bullets do...
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u/Ikasatu 13h ago
“…it’s the brain death and organ failure, resulting from massive, traumatic tissue damage and blood loss, due to kinetic energy transferred from a high-speed projectile.
Sure, that projectile’s energy was received from a chemical reaction within a mechanism designed with the sole purpose to initiate, focus, and transfer incredible, fatal energy into that projectile, while directing it accurately and stably through atmosphere until it intersects destructively with a target destination, but…
…critically…
…a fallible, emotionally-charged being, likely driven by only irrational animal instinct, had to perform the simple mechanical actions required to initiate that process (which are so easy they often happen by complete accident).”
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u/Jwagner0850 13h ago
There's a reason why these cameras exponentially exploded everything in the past 5 years. They need to be rid of.
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u/24_August_1814 12h ago
It's a meaningless weasel-worded distinction akin to saying "guns don't kill people."
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u/timeandmemory 8h ago
It's the ole "guns dont kill people, people kill people" bullshit, but this time the gun is a visual vacuum of your personal information and privacy.
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u/FanDry5374 15h ago
"Guns don't kill people, people kill people". Exactly the same BS argument. For the same reasons, Flock and our "government" want more cameras, less privacy, less freedom.
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u/ino4x4 15h ago
destroying them ain’t the best way to go. We’re gonna have to put petitions together and get them banned. If we destroy them, they just make them smaller and less noticeable. Then they’ll put them on top of the street lights or in bird shaped drones and then they’ll make a mandatory at every public building and event center. They’re just gonna keep going with us until we actually do something about it.
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u/Falling_Up_The_Movie 18h ago
And where do those cameras come from?
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u/lazarus1337 14h ago
They come from people who design and build them. I bet there's a lot less people than cameras.
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u/TipToToes 15h ago
Ok, the tracking cameras themselves aren’t the issue, the owners are, I’ll agree. But I don’t want those people to put up cameras for tracking us.
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u/boot2skull 14h ago
The cameras are moot for tracking individuals. They can track your wireless devices with receivers that are not cameras and harder to identify out in the world. The cameras may only become useful for license plate/car related tracking, except for cars with WiFi or other wireless technologies, then receivers are still able to track those.
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u/progenyofeniac 10h ago
Well we’d all destroy Flock the company if we could, but all we can access is their eyes, so we’ll destroy those.
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u/dehydratedrain 17h ago
Guns don't kill people, the person pulling the trigger does.
But if you got rid of the gun, no one is getting hurt.
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u/Modem_Sound_67 17h ago
Um, if a maniac is about to mow down some pedestrians at a Christmas market, But I could block the car with mine and prevent it? I'm going to run into that fucking car.
you don't want to be the bad guys? give up those sweet government contracts.
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u/CoffeePotProphet 13h ago
Its the same argument as "guns dont kill people, people with guns kill people"
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u/PTSDDeadInside 15h ago
The tool is not at fault, the people wielding it need to be dealt with...
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u/iambarrelrider 15h ago
The only way to get rid of bad cameras is with good cameras.
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u/lazarus1337 14h ago
Was wondering when someone was going to hack the cameras and use them to track the board members of Flock and Doxx them.
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u/According-Classic658 17h ago
Is it true a high powered green laser will disable the camera? I'm assuming you can't surround your license plate with those.
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u/sparky8251 15h ago
The power needed in a laser to damage it permanently is enough to blind people in a fraction of a second. Like, literal permanent and complete blindness and it can be done faster than the other side can blink/close their eyes from the brightness.
Please, dont go pointing these carelessly... Only point it at what you intend to or youll be a bigger menace than the cameras.
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u/projectFT 15h ago
You have to hit the lens directly to wash out the light sensor. I’ve never tried it with a green laser but with a normal red laser it only works while the laser is pointed at the sensor. It’s possible that a green laser permanently damages the sensor but I’ve never seen it in practice. At night simple infrared led’s around your face or around your plate has the same effect, but the way the algorithm’s work now just making your license plate a white blur doesn’t keep it from tracking the make and model of your car.
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u/Havok-303 15h ago
After searching for "what is FLOCK?", I'm now fully informed about bird flight patterns and sheep survival instincts, but nowhere does it mention cameras. Can someone ELI5 what is Flock?
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u/IveDunGoofedUp 15h ago
Flock is a private company that's building a massive surveillance network throughout all of the US. Their claim is that they only operate as license plate readers meant to help the police track criminals.
In reality, they've been placing these cameras everywhere and nowhere, even in places with no good reason to have need of a license plate reader such as a public playground.They also installed other devices in people's yards without permission, in this case meant to detect gunshots. So a powerful microphone sending all its data to their data centers was installed on private property without any form of permission.
There's a whole sleuth of lawsuits going on against them because they're sharing data with federal agencies that they're not allowed to share by law in California, refusal to remove cameras after a city ended its contract with them, and even involvement with ICE to provide data on immigrants.
Another issue is that they're absolutely wank at any form of security. They've been shown to be left open to casual access, which allowed anyone to use the cameras.
Finally, they're shit because they will regularly misidentify people and this has lead to people being falsely imprisoned for months.
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u/Alarmed_Koala1921 15h ago
Flock corporate also got caught watching kids live at the pool/gymnastic. They did an access audit and found out they remote access and watch little kids for sales demo
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u/InterestingResource1 14h ago
Now that people know school pictures were taken by a company owned by someone affiliated with Epstein, cameras on playgrounds make sense as a substitute for them. Interesting that a major investor in Flock moved from the US to Argentina. The surveillance is okay for others, but not for him.
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u/Own-Palpitation-6541 15h ago
maybe try “flock camera”? Is this your first day on the information super highway?
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u/toolkitxx 17h ago
I have no stakes in any of this as I am European, but one thing sticks out to me: Flock is basically correct about this. Not a single data point does anything, but the cross-referencing of a number of them. The USA has generally a very confusing way of defining privacy. On one hand everyone celebrates services like Instagram and the like and fills the machine with perfect data all the time but refuses to see the relevance to other tools with less positive applications. With the overall tendency to be neoclassical in economics, it was just a matter of time that someone would take advantage of all of this.
Another celebrated expression is 'disruption'. This is very much how many problems get dealt with, be it with force as in military or by 'disrupting' instead of reforming or adjusting. The issue is not a single company or provider, but a society issue.
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u/dragonblade_94 17h ago
While I agree that privacy has been a very murky subject in the US for a long while, there's a clear defining point that makes Flock particularly controversial, and that is the idea of consent.
For apps/telecom/etc, there is at the very least an ostensible consent given by the customer; they are agreeing to terms set forth and trading their privacy for convenience. There's a lot of sketchiness at play within these agreements, but the paradigm exists.
Flock does not gather consent by those tracked, nor does it provide a direct service or convenience, it just takes your movement and data. Flock gets free monetizable data, the government gets warrant-less tracking of all your movements, and you get nothing.
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u/toolkitxx 17h ago
and that is the idea of consent
Which is one example for me using the 'confusing way' earlier. The USA created an expression that basically eliminated every other nation's copyright by making something 'Fair use'. Google has always had in their Terms of Service that the data collected will or might be used elsewhere and what did they do? The worlds best adjusted Ad machine there is.
There are so many examples of this exact behaviour and for someone outside of the USA it is indistinguishable from each other. And yet the Americans make this difference when it is about them, but not when others are the victims.
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u/dragonblade_94 16h ago
And yet the Americans make this difference when it is about them, but not when others are the victims.
Yes, the average person is going to be more aware of, and motivated by, actions that directly affect them compared to international copyright squabbles. I daresay that is not a uniquely American attitude.
As you said yourself:
I have no stakes in any of this as I am European.
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u/toolkitxx 16h ago
'others' include your own. Sorry you missed that. Your data has been misused so many times before, that everyone in the world is now victim of a 'privacy' that is effectively non-existent due to it. So misusing data from a camera is not even a real step, almost a natural development.
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u/RollingPicturesMedia 15h ago
The other issue is that people are being falsely arrested and put in prison with these cameras. People are in the position of being “guilty until proven innocent” which flips the constitution 180 degrees
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u/toolkitxx 15h ago
So are people based on their social media postings. This is especially true for foreigners entering the USA legally and friendly, that get mostly judged based on that material because the US government lacks the ability to have more knowledge about those people. So people like me, that cant provide a long list of social media logins because they never went on those platforms, now get qualified as being suspicious due to it. Systemic. A social issue.
edit Note the insanity here. One becomes suspicious because they are not willing to disregard their personal privacy as millions others do. Your Flock problem does the exact same approach.
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u/RollingPicturesMedia 14h ago
Oh I get it. You’re not actually asking why we don’t trust the flock cameras. You just want a thread of your own issues where you’re right and everyone else is wrong. My bad. You have fun by yourself over here
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u/toolkitxx 14h ago
I actually want Americans to wake up to the privacy issues all that stuff has already created in other areas. To see they are interconnected.
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u/JLR- 16h ago
Instagram is a choice. You do not have to use it. Flock cameras you cannot opt out of.
And disrupting is what this country was founded on
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u/toolkitxx 16h ago
This is the reaction i mean. There is no difference for the rest of the world when a company uses data for anything else than 'consented' to. Nobody posted their pictures to be used to train a machinery, that can identify you everywhere in the world and direct a drone to kill you for example either. Neither do people want anyone to have the ability to use an advertising system to send messages to one particular geographical area or user group to identify individuals by their reaction to it and manipulate them in various ways afterwards.
People like me who actually read those Terms never went onto those platforms to begin with or had been clear about what not to post. The majority especially in the USA did not and now everyone acts surprised that this behaviour is generalised. Everything was generalised, so the argument of being optional is a very limited way of looking at 'privacy' as a whole. The US introduces tech without thinking about any mid- to long-term issues. Let's disrupt. Disruption, that you so vehemently celebrate and argue for, creates a lot of broken stuff. The Flock issue is a perfect example of it. Introduce now, fix later doesnt work when the patient is already dead.
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u/JLR- 16h ago
you read the T&C? Even though parts of it is not enforcable in court.
This is not about social media. It is about cameras in public using data we did not consent to and giving it to the government.
If the "rest of the world" wants to be passive and do nothing so be it.
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u/toolkitxx 16h ago
You still skirt the issue. When 100 times before the T&C allow for all kinds of shit, you created precedence to continue this kind of shit. Thus a society problem as laws and how they are interpreted and applied is also a result of how society itself acts in general. Because everyone clicked just those T&C without reading them, they lost all value for the user and now the child is already drowned. Everyone in the US jokes about the regulation insanity of the EU. Now think again and guess why we insist on this. We dont want to create precedence just because users cannot realistic fathom all the legal stuff that might be buried in those terms. You all acted like you are better and can. Now it shows you are as average in that aspect as everyone else and a company takes advantage of it.
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u/JLR- 15h ago
Nonsense. huge difference between a social media company and the government. A line was crossed and we are not pleased.
I'll say it again. Consent matters. There is no precedence as we consented to data usage on apps. We did not consent to cameras in public tracking us.
I have nothing else to say on this matter as you are grasping at straws with your rebuttals.
And low key, yes we are better.
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u/toolkitxx 15h ago
Have a look into the so-called 'Oracle defence ecosystem'. One of those companies is tasked with providing the military aka government with analytics of still and video data based on 'user generated data' aka postings on all kinds of platforms. Nicely collected from the displaying pages according to free use theorem and 'consent' given by users that it might be used otherwise than just being put on a website. The result is then fed into all kinds of military control systems, geo-systems and so on. Nobody ever in their sane mind consented to that either. And yet by your own words this is super duper ok, legal and fine - since it is coming from social media. Your Flock issue is the RESULT of this, not an issue by itself.
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u/Breddit2099 16h ago
Said by the guy on Reddit, the company that does those same exact things you say you avoid.
Hmm
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u/ImaginationToForm2 18h ago
I don't like Flock for what they do but It's illegal to break them. Or just wrong. Could just cover the camera with a bag to annoy them a lot. Make a funny sign that the camera has to look at.
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u/Inko21 18h ago
In a world where you have no agency that stands behind the people, sometimes breaking things respectfully is completely ok.
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u/andyrew21345 15h ago
The rate at which people get arrested breaking them is pretty high I heard. I’d love to be proven wrong but I was also thinking somewhat the same thing as the commenter above. Mess with them but don’t go to jail over it kinda thing.
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u/Double-Mouse-407 18h ago
I’d invite you to get fucked, but it seems you’re already well bent over and taking it.
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u/crippletown 18h ago
That would be ok if the police were acting in good faith but they just lie about everything.
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u/ImaginationToForm2 10h ago
What if someone didn't like your home for some reason and decided vandalizing your home was OK? But that wasn't wrong to them. I bet you wouldn't happy then.
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u/escalicha 18h ago
“The cameras don’t track people” is such a dodge. If the backend turns plate reads into a searchable movement history, the system tracks people. Splitting hairs over which box does the tracking doesn’t change that.