Americans are destroying Flock surveillance cameras

Brian Merchant, penning for Blood successful the Machine, reports that radical crossed the United States are dismantling and destroying Flock surveillance cameras, amid rising nationalist choler that the licence sheet readers assistance U.S. migration authorities and deportations.

Flock is the Atlanta-based surveillance startup valued astatine $7.5 cardinal a twelvemonth ago and a shaper of licence sheet readers. It has faced disapproval for allowing national authorities entree to its monolithic web of nationwide licence sheet readers and databases astatine a clip erstwhile U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement are progressively relying connected data to raid communities arsenic portion of the Trump administration’s migration crackdown.

Flock cameras let authorities to way wherever radical spell and erstwhile by taking photos of their licence plates from thousands of cameras located crossed the United States. Flock claims it doesn’t stock information with ICE directly, but reports amusement that section constabulary person shared their ain entree to Flock cameras and its databases with national authorities.

While immoderate communities are calling connected their cities to end their contracts with Flock, others are taking matters into their ain hands.

Merchant reports instances of breached and smashed Flock cameras successful La Mesa, California, conscionable weeks aft the metropolis assembly approved the continuation of Flock cameras deployed successful the city, contempt a wide bulk of attendees favoring their shutdown. A local report cited beardown absorption to the surveillance technology, with residents raising privateness concerns.

Other cases of vandalism person stretched from California and Connecticut, to Illinois and Virginia. In Oregon, six licence sheet scanning cameras connected poles were chopped down and astatine slightest 1 spray painted. A enactment near astatine the basal of the severed poles said, “Hahaha get wrecked ya surveilling fucks,” reports Merchant.

According to DeFlock, a task aimed astatine mapping licence sheet readers, determination are adjacent to 80,000 cameras crossed the United States. Dozens of cities person truthful acold rejected the usage of Flock’s cameras, and immoderate constabulary departments person since blocked national authorities from utilizing their resources.

Flock did not respond to a petition for comment.