Flock Accused of Reactivating Its Cameras Without Notifying a Town (msn.com) 28
A Massachusetts newspaper reports that officials from the town of Littleton (population: 10,141) "claim that five of Littletonâ(TM)s Flock Safety cameras were switched back on by the company without informing the town..."
Littleton had temporarily disabled the cameras earlier this year, according to the article, but upon discovering the cameras were still active, city officials say they directed the Town Counsel "to initiate cancellation of the contract with Flock Safety and directed the Town Administrator to coordinate the removal of the six cameras on public ways" with the Department of Public Works.
Ironically, it's the same Massachusetts town that last year was breached by a Chinese-state-sponsored hacking group for over 300 days.
Flock has also considered dashcams installed in hundreds of thousands Uber, Lyft, and delivery drivers' vehicles "to scan license plates those drivers travelled passed," reports 404 Media, "essentially turning Uber and Lyft drivers into roaming surveillance vehicles, according to a Flock presentation shared with 404 Media... 404 Media first revealed the intended partnership last August when multiple sources provided information on the plan."
Littleton had temporarily disabled the cameras earlier this year, according to the article, but upon discovering the cameras were still active, city officials say they directed the Town Counsel "to initiate cancellation of the contract with Flock Safety and directed the Town Administrator to coordinate the removal of the six cameras on public ways" with the Department of Public Works.
Ironically, it's the same Massachusetts town that last year was breached by a Chinese-state-sponsored hacking group for over 300 days.
Flock has also considered dashcams installed in hundreds of thousands Uber, Lyft, and delivery drivers' vehicles "to scan license plates those drivers travelled passed," reports 404 Media, "essentially turning Uber and Lyft drivers into roaming surveillance vehicles, according to a Flock presentation shared with 404 Media... 404 Media first revealed the intended partnership last August when multiple sources provided information on the plan."
Put a locked bag over them. (Score:4, Funny)
The city should duffel bag and padlock all the cameras with something similar to what you used to find on parking meters out of service.
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A sawzall would be better.
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Yes it would, but might open the city to legal liability.
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Are the cameras not paid for by the city?
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Good question. Does the city pay for exclusive use of the data? Or can Flock contract with other entities and provide a feed?
AFAIK, the cameras belong to Flock.
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Does the city pay for exclusive use of the data? Or can Flock contract with other entities and provide a feed?
We've seen enough stories about national government misuse of these camera feeds to assume there's no "exclusive access" provision in these contracts.
Re: Put a locked bag over them. (Score:2)
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That would also better communicate "That thing is off".
Do they have microphones?
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Whatever you do, DO NOT apply thermite to the camera and ignite it.
In Minecraft.
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Something Something don't point strong laser pointers at the lens, something.
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liquid chalk marker tied to an extendable pole. just a little dab and nobody has to climb a ladder or buy a bunch of dufflebags and locks.
even cheaper would be cornstarch and water like to paint on a car windshield (for sale, just married, etc), but applying it is a little less obvious than above.
Only response (Score:5, Funny)
This is a job for...SAWZALL MAN!
cue heroic music
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By complete coincidence I recently purchased this cordless angle grinder kit [amzn.to] after watching a glowing review from one of my regular channels and wondering how good it could be for $75. It's not as good as a Milwaukee but I've been using it around the house and I'm going to modify a shoe rack with it this evening.
Of course this has nothing to do with the story and surely these aren't the types of arms the Framers envisioned when they set the foundation of upholding the Constitution upon the duties of the Ci
Lets think about that (Score:5, Informative)
Town contracts with Flock to provide ALPR functions. Flock gets the appropriate pole rental contracts and installs cameras. City has a change of heart and asks that the cameras be shut off. Flock does so, but then is contacted by another customer interested in the data feed. Flock says, "The cameras are already up. Just turn them on and serve the new contract."
A couple of things come to mind:
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Pole is on public property. Unless there is a valid "lease" on said property, the use of the pole is not valid. If the lease is still valid, then yes, they can do what they want.
Re: Lets think about that (Score:1)
The town can simply ban that sort of surveillance. Contract can go fuck itself if the law supersedes it, yes retroactively.
This retarded idea that a company can do whatever it wants because of a weasely contract is false.
The residents control the town, not some secretly foreign run mass surveillance company these idiots keep getting bribed by.
We need "HIPAA for location data" (Score:4, Interesting)
Right now, it is legal for third parties like Flock to collect surveillance data and offer it for sale to anyone.
The third party doctrine makes it presumed OK for third parties to give or sell their data to the Government.
This is rapidly eroding Fourth Amendment guarantees in the US.
One possible way out would be to specify in federal law that data that can enable mass surveillance must be protected - leaking it gets you fined, government doesn't get it without a warrant.
The HIPAA laws are a potential model here - they basically say data related to health care can only be shared between certain businesses, and only with the permission of the person the data is about.
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they basically say data related to health care can only be shared between certain businesses
They say data can be shared for TPO or sometimes for research purposes and the latter leans on anonymization which may or may not have been conducted correctly, probably not since it's hard. We need a much tighter standard that never allows sharing the data with another party without a warrant.
Re: We need "HIPAA for location data" (Score:2)
Lolol some armchair warrior hates facts.
I get trained on HIPAA every year...
Dashcams (Score:3)