281–290 of 468 posts
That’s a big misconception, flock is a car identification system not a license plate one. I have seen many videos of some crime documentaries where flock was used to ID cars with no license plates, and weeks later they still have them in the system to track, coupled with phone tracking, they know exactly all the details needed.
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I could believe that perma-cameraing every inch of public space is more akin to chemo than to vitamin gummies, that SF had the city equivalent of bone cancer, and that this doesn’t mean healthy midwestern towns need Flock in any way.
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An obnoxious, autoplay-at-full-volume ad that took the page an extra 30 seconds to load and somehow bypassed firefox adblockers...
Firefox 149 + ublock origin did not display ads for me
Non-US citizens - what's the situation with cameras in public spaces where you live? In my town every 2nd hour or building entrance has a private camera pointed at the street. It's very depressing because the cops don't care - I've asked 2 in a patrol car when there was a mild case of vandalism I witnessed. Technically it's illegal, but nothing happens. The public cameras are on intersection and some bus stops. Too m…
Japan is exporting it's AI-enhanced crime prediction platform across LatAm after successfully deploying it in Tokyo [0]. Japan is doing similar work to analyze financial transactions [1]. South Korea has also deployed a similar surveillance platform called Dejaview [2]. Even Finland has been deploying surveillance camera fusion centers [3] The brutal reality is everyone is doing this and there's nothing you can do ab…
The world is the most stable and peaceful it's been in decades if not longer. What is your evidence that the world is unstable?
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Surveillance tech can alter peoples behavior. I know I'm personally more stressed when I know I'm being filmed, even if I'm doing nothing wrong. https://academic.oup.com/nc/article/2024/1/niae039/7920510?l...
Untrue at a population level, just compare anxiety disorders and self-reported anxiety between USA and China.
I'm not saying that it couldn't be true, but we have no way of concluding that from just comparing such rates. There are many differences in daily life and thresholds for reporting beyond surveillance levels.
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It's gotten worse: I'm so tired of rampant crime that I'm up for a little surveillance. And I used to donate to the ACLU before they went crazy.
Yup. Some "teens" can riding down my street with a pellet gun shooting at the cars. They ended up breaking 3 to 5 windows. It probably cost us collectively $3000++. The only problem with the license plate readers is that the "teens" drive cars with fake tags. They deliberately copy the plate numbers from some granny with the same model. Makes it fun when the SWAT team knocks on Granny's door.
- is trivially defeated by teenagers
- is used by police departments as evidence to legally justify violent raids for property damage
- whose data is mishandled by law enforcement agencies who don't do due diligence
... should have more widespread adoption and support?
And switches to Axon - https://denverite.com/2026/02/24/denver-ends-flock-contract-... I have not done any research if that's out of the frying pan and into the fire or an improvement
The Axon contract is smaller than the Flock one, 50 cameras instead of >100, but that's because it's all they could get budget for, and they want to expand. DPD owns the data and is theoretically not supposed to share it with federal agencies, but there are lots of legal ways to make them comply. They're setting a 21-day retention period for data that's not part of an ongoing investigation, but I think that's missing the point, and it's not codified into law. The Axon cameras can be switched into a mode where DPD can view live feeds. Most of the contract provisions that the mayor's office added because of significant public outcry I would call "token." They're not addressing the real issues, and it's still contributing heavily to the development of the surveillance state.
Overall, it's an improvement, in the sense that breaking your leg is better than breaking both your legs. But don't get me wrong, they're coming for the other one as soon as they can.
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A big part of the value is the network: track a stolen a car or a suspect in the next town over or across the country.
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The sky is blue. See? I posted a fact. My comment is fully valid and you can't say anything about it. Oh? It's irrelevant to the topic?
It may be too subtle for you, but I was actually making the point that the surveillance panopticon theory was mostly triggered by the fact that Flock is cloud-based.
I'm basically making a distinction between a hypothetical non-cloud Flock vs cloud-Flock.
And it may be too complex a concept, but ex-lovers, union organizers, and journlists could use whatever camera-based ALPR existed, even if it wasn't cloud-based.
Making your comment irrelevant.
Thank you for it though.
And switches to Axon - https://denverite.com/2026/02/24/denver-ends-flock-contract-... I have not done any research if that's out of the frying pan and into the fire or an improvement
Practically, axon cameras aren't nearly as ubiquitous as flock's, thus reducing the leo's dragnet capability. I'm sure the feds will successfully try to get access to this footage as well.
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Any dataset involving police actions will show high concentrations in poor areas because that's where police patrol the most and where they're most likely to crack down on behaviors that might be allowed to slide elsewhere (in part due to the racial demographics of those areas).
Usually allocation decisions are related to actual car/pedestrian fatality/injury counts + trial placements and measurements. Either way, wouldn't you be in favor of measures that remove police from overpoliced poor neighborhoods in favor of a technology focusing on traffic safety enforcement?