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Flock's CEO Faced Me After Its Cameras Led to My Wrongful Stop

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Re: Flock's CEO Faced Me After Its Cameras Led to My Wrongful Stop

#91

Post by patrickmay »

scoofy wrote: post #88

I think a discussion we're not having is how policing should exist moving forward given this technology exists for criminals as well. We literally have people driving around with electromagnets on their license plates to cheat any number of perfectly reasonable traffic instruments. We have folks breaking into and going for joyrides in cars that lack engine immobilizers by exploiting them, then ditching them often aft…

> how do we have law enforcement without hiring a literal army of police officers?

Just like we did way back in 2023 before the massive nationwide rollout of Flock cameras.

A surveillance state is the antithesis of what the U.S. founders gave us. It is fundamentally illiberal.

Re: Flock's CEO Faced Me After Its Cameras Led to My Wrongful Stop

#92

Post by buttercraft »

pc86 wrote: post #51
scrapcode wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> as much as I dislike Flock, it seems like it wasn't at fault here. 34DTM != 34DTM10

No license plate matching system required full, exact matches to return any hits. That has nothing to do with Flock.

The incident would not have happened without Flock misreading the small numbers in the middle of the plate as it tracked them around town.

Re: Flock's CEO Faced Me After Its Cameras Led to My Wrongful Stop

#93

Post by dundarious »

behringer wrote: post #43
legitster wrote: post #30

I know we're all sharpening pitchforks for Flock - but the national license plate database has been leading to mistakes like this for decades . Some states also compound the problem by issuing a license plate number multiple times . So long before Flock getting someone else's speed camera tickets in the mail was already a problem.

A mistake like this wouldn't be so bad if we didn't have flock cameras everywher.

Yes, building a highly reactive automated system upon flawed foundations is bad.

Re: Flock's CEO Faced Me After Its Cameras Led to My Wrongful Stop

#94

Post by macintux »

FireBeyond wrote: post #63
scrapcode wrote: post #21

I am absolutely biased, but there is a lot of attempt to shift or at least share the blame here and not a lot of accountability. Flock themselves mis-translated the plate, plain and simple, and should not be being used in production for alerting authorities on very serious matters. We are already very aware that the police overreact and make plenty of mistakes. The obvious here being that even if this was the exact p…

I wish Garrett had been asked about his attitude towards false positives and negatives. He's previously said that he feels false positives are a better option than negatives.

There are many challenging questions that should have been asked, and weren't.

Re: Flock's CEO Faced Me After Its Cameras Led to My Wrongful Stop

#95

Post by dundarious »

Is there any evidence or other form of justification for the Flock CEO's claims about how it is responsible for SF's crime downturn? I find it hard to believe that Flock cameras are at the heart of such a wide-ranging effect. I am not a local, and I have only done a cursory search, but I don't see the elected officials making the same claim -- I have seen them say it has more to do with changing socioeconomic factors.

Re: Flock's CEO Faced Me After Its Cameras Led to My Wrongful Stop

#97

Post by efromvt »

sterlind wrote: post #17

seems like: - cop messed up, added an incomplete license plate number (34DTM) into the NCIC database. - Flock cameras found his fancy car, a $155k Range Rover, which had a license plate like 34DTM10, and flagged it. - cops didn't bother checking the police report before they went in and surrounded him. thoughts: - as much as I dislike Flock, it seems like it wasn't at fault here. this was a scene straight of Brazil,…

The system needs to account for how it will be used and resulting externalities. Being an accelerant can be a problem in and of itself. I do agree that having stricter societal and legal guardrails here is probably better then relying on companies to do the right thing, though.

Re: Flock's CEO Faced Me After Its Cameras Led to My Wrongful Stop

#98

Post by gumby »

zenapollo wrote: post #42
scrapcode wrote: post #21

I am absolutely biased, but there is a lot of attempt to shift or at least share the blame here and not a lot of accountability. Flock themselves mis-translated the plate, plain and simple, and should not be being used in production for alerting authorities on very serious matters. We are already very aware that the police overreact and make plenty of mistakes. The obvious here being that even if this was the exact p…

In Pampano beach FL my 76 yo mother got pulled over for driving a stolen vehicle. Luckily the police had some common sense to decipher what happened. Plate swap, same make model and color.

I’m not a criminal*, but I hope when I’m 76 I’ll still be sufficiently lithe and compos mentis to pull off a career in crime, should I so choose.

* Though wouldn’t a criminal say that?

Re: Flock's CEO Faced Me After Its Cameras Led to My Wrongful Stop

#99

Post by [deleted] »

righthand wrote: post #66
pc86 wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Flock can be a terrible unconstitutional company and this particular incident can have nothing to do with that and not be Flock's responsibility in any way. Acting like anyone who understands how true legacy ALPR systems work and how police officers track plates and search for stolen vehicles are by extension somehow supporting or excusing Flock is ridiculous. Nearly the exact same thing could have happened with trad…

Nope! Traditional ALPR systems follow the law and do not give out access like candy and do not automate flagging and tracking individuals. Traditional systems are not a dragnet. This is 100% the fault of Flock.

[deleted]

Re: Flock's CEO Faced Me After Its Cameras Led to My Wrongful Stop

#100

Post by pc86 »

righthand wrote: post #66
pc86 wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Flock can be a terrible unconstitutional company and this particular incident can have nothing to do with that and not be Flock's responsibility in any way. Acting like anyone who understands how true legacy ALPR systems work and how police officers track plates and search for stolen vehicles are by extension somehow supporting or excusing Flock is ridiculous. Nearly the exact same thing could have happened with trad…

Nope! Traditional ALPR systems follow the law and do not give out access like candy and do not automate flagging and tracking individuals. Traditional systems are not a dragnet. This is 100% the fault of Flock.

> But when the police report was created and the plate was entered into Flock’s system, it was just recorded as 34 DTM.

The license plate is 34 DTM. There is nothing about Flock that caused this to happen - had any officer run this plate while sitting behind the car in traffic, exactly the same thing would have happened.

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