Forgot your password?
typodupeerror
AI Transportation

Flock Blamed for Wrongful 13-Day Imprisonment and a Police Stalking Incident in Florida (cnn.com) 115

From the transportation news site MotorBiscuit: In late September 2026, 23-year-old Liz Lindseay Isaacs testified before a Senate Judiciary Subcommittee about her harrowing experience after a Flock camera misidentified her Dodge Durango, linking her to a fatal hit-and-run miles away from where she actually was... "The cell door was shut, and it was not opened for approximately 86 hours". She spent a total of 13 days locked up — including the terrifying stint in solitary confinement — before prosecutors finally realized the AI had completely botched the vehicle identification and dropped the charges.
A Flock spokesperson contacted for a CNN report argued the incident "appears to have been the result of human errors in judgment unrelated to Flock." The woman is now suing the Florida patrol over wrongful arrest, saying she partially blames the two police officers who she says claimed there was incriminating damage on her vehicle when there wasn't. But her lawyer says he blames Flock. "Because if it wasn't for Flock we wouldn't be here in the first place, and this whole nightmare... would not have kicked off."

And while police claim Flock solves more crimes, the lawyer adds that "you would also solve a lot more crimes if the police were allowed to kick down your door and come in and search your house whenever they want to, or search your car whenever they want to or violate your rights in other ways. There has to be safeguards in police that comport through the 4th Amendment, like the warrant requirements. It's as simple as that. This technology is growing so fast that we are unable to control it. And we must get ahead of it." And the woman incarcerated for 13 days agreed. "I wouldn't have went to jail if it wasn't for Flock."

Florida was also the site of another Flock-related news story. ("Florida Deputy Allegedly Used Flock Cameras to Stalk 17-Year-Old Girl, Visiting Her at Work 9 Times".) The officer "was charged with official misconduct and accessing computer electronic devices without authority — both are third-degree felonies. In Florida, if he's found guilty on both charges, he could be sentenced to up to 10 years in prison."

"Americans have no idea who's looking at that information, or why it has to be collected in the first place," U.S. Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer said Sunday, adding "They deserve to know." SCHUMER: "This company said the data on its cameras was encrypted and secure. Then hackers took one down and found the key sitting right there," Schumer said. "Most Americans just want to get to work and get home to their families without a private company keeping a file on where they go. The next step here is simple: turn the lens around and zoom in on Flock." Schumer also demanded answers from Flock about how much data from its cameras sits on its servers and whether any federal agency has accessed that data, directly or through local law enforcement.
Schumer's office sent an official letter to Flock's CEO giving them 12 days to respond to its questions about Flock's data retention and security policies. "Americans should not have to sacrifice their right to privacy simply by driving down a public street," Schumer wrote.

And in other news... Garrett Langley, the CEO of Flock Safety — a company that deploys over 120,000 automated license plate reader cameras across the United States — recently requested that his Atlanta home be blurred out on Google Maps Street View. In swift retaliation, online activists pinpointed the property and officially marked his front lawn as a "Public Toilet" on the mapping app.

Flock Blamed for Wrongful 13-Day Imprisonment and a Police Stalking Incident in Florida

Comments Filter:
  • Not Flock (Score:5, Insightful)

    by diaz ( 816483 ) on Monday October 05, 2026 @07:46AM (#66363432)

    I saw part of the testimony. This all comes down to human over-aggressiveness—not even mistakes.

    The detective used Flock to look for all Dodge Durangos within a radius of the accident. They located her at her apartment. So far, so good. But her car is a different color than what eyewitnesses said. Other details did not match up with eyewitness accounts. There was NO damage to her vehicle, but they arrested her anyway. The detective doubled down and the police continued there prosecution of her.

    I'm no fan of Flock, but in this case it's simply bad police.

    • Re:Not Flock (Score:5, Insightful)

      by bickerdyke ( 670000 ) on Monday October 05, 2026 @08:00AM (#66363440)

      But Flock (or other technology) is fuel or at least a catalyst to such "bad police".

      Second in place only to the habit to cover up police misbehaviour.

      Everyone who talks about "just a few bad apples" needs to remember that the saying is that "Just a few bad apples will spoil the batch"

      • Still doesn't make this flocks fault in any way...

        • Re: Not Flock (Score:5, Insightful)

          by fluffernutter ( 1411889 ) on Monday October 05, 2026 @09:08AM (#66363540)
          And guns don't kill people... they just help people kill 50 at once instead of 1. Therefore you still have to acknowledge their large role in killing people.
        • Re: Not Flock (Score:3, Insightful)

          by logjon ( 1411219 )
          I argued the same when I gave a loaded gun to a homeless man having a psychotic break.
        • by SumDog ( 466607 )
          The dependence on "AI" is the danger because it's incredibly stupid, and officers are not very smart. They need solid foundational training to favors innocence. They do get a lot of that, and it's almost always bad laws that lead to these situations (including the entire war on drugs).

          Flock is a big problem here because it is clearly violating the 4th amendment. You can say "they're in public" and sure .. that's true. But when you start doing deep analytics automatically on everyone in "public," it's mor
      • Just a few bad apples will spoil the batch

        Correction: One bad apple will spoil the barrel.

        Aside: A common excuse involves "good cops". But there's never a 'good' cop around when a cop goes bad. The ordinariness of police officers doing bad things reveals there's many more bad cops than 'good' cops. Since police are not punished for, and rarely blamed for, bad behaviour, it is a systemic flaw. Framing systemic behaviour as "a few bad apples" is excusing the criminal immunity given to the people demanding everyone else obey the law.

        • It's a no-win situation to do the right thing as a good cop. Call out the bad ones, then you're looking over your back from retaliation for the rest of your life, assuming you have much life left to live. (Better Call Saul demonstrates this pretty well).
          • While the reasons matter they aren't relevant to the point, which is that any cops covering for bad cops aren't good cops. If the system is designed to reject good cops, then both the system and the cops are bad.

          • "'Better Call Saul"

            Um, using popular entertainment as an example of real life behavior is not quite as dumb as it gets, but it's on the same block.

          • by flink ( 18449 )

            It's a no-win situation to do the right thing as a good cop. Call out the bad ones, then you're looking over your back from retaliation for the rest of your life, assuming you have much life left to live. (Better Call Saul demonstrates this pretty well).

            That's where ACAB comes from. The "good ones" might be good people in their personal lives, but the system forces them to behave as bastards when they are being a cop.

          • The journalism outfit Invisible Institute conducted a data analysis of all public police records in Chicago. What they found was that a small part of the force (oh, say, 3%) were real bad apples, criminals in uniform really, many citizen complains for abuse, theft, etc. And another 1/3 of the force systematically covered for these guys. Would just happen to be in places miles outside of their patrol areas, or far from their homes or usual haunts, yet witnessed alleged events to exonerate the officer. And th

        • "two police officers who she says claimed there was incriminating damage on her vehicle"

          "But her car is a different color"

          Common police tactics, and generally legal, but not very ethical.

          The claim of evidence, whether it is true or not, is a common interrogation tactic, intended to elicit a confession. This is when you, the accused, either demand a lawyer be present to represent you, or clam up and invoke your right to remain silent (and let them prove their case on their own).

          The mistaken color is another

          • This is when you, the accused, either demand a lawyer be present to represent you, or clam up and invoke your right to remain silent (and let them prove their case on their own).

            The mistaken color is another common police tactic. t.

            Always ask for a lawyer immediately when questioned in such cases. Do not wait, do not pass go, do not collect $200.

          • by flink ( 18449 )

            The claim of evidence, whether it is true or not, is a common interrogation tactic, intended to elicit a confession. This is when you, the accused, either demand a lawyer be present to represent you, or clam up and invoke your right to remain silent (and let them prove their case on their own).

            Except we are bombarded with messaging starting in pre school that police are your friends, and there to protect you, and are "just trying to do what's right". You take a person who's raised on that their entire life and then put them in a police interrogation room and now their entire future depends on them acting like a hardened criminal and you are not going to get good outcomes.

            It is insane that these rights aren't positively asserted by default and that the police are allowed to talk to interrogate yo

            • If Miranda rights were written a little like the Second Amendment, police would indeed have a PD in house for this. But even the 2nd Amendment, despite 'shall not...', is regularly sidestepped. Bear in mind, though, that in many big cities the schools are teaching that police are the enemy. They fail, however, to follow that up with 0) know your rights, and 1) STAY OUT OF TROUBLE. But to make big city school systems are cheating students out of a future. It's criminal.

              • Bear in mind, though, that in many big cities the schools are teaching that police are the enemy. They fail, however, to follow that up with 0) know your rights, and 1) STAY OUT OF TROUBLE. But to make big city school systems are cheating students out of a future. It's criminal.

                Citation needed. Since there are "many" you can surely cite a few, with evidence links.

          • Everyone should view the "Never Talk to the Police" video.

        • by Jerrry ( 43027 )

          If there were good cops, there'd be no bad cops.

      • I'm in Ontario, Canada.

        I think Flock is accountable here, they built an AI that gives unwarranted trust. If Flock is really innocent, lets open Flock to everyone, and let anyone use it's massive cache, since it's recording the people, and the people control the government; therefore, people should have access to what Flock captures. I think Flock should be flipped, let it record the government, and government employees, and let the people monitor it, to make sure our tax dollars aren't being wasted.
    • The police amount to a hammer. They aren't paid to think, only to arrest criminals. Computer says Durango, person guilty, arrest.

      • That's not how it works, Flock identifies a suspected vehicle, detective (the one that gets paid to think) has to check the provided evidence before asking for an arrestwarrant, and in the end the patrolofficers just execute the warrant, they have to rely on the person issuing it to do their job properly and not having to question the warrant.
        • The detective is paid to maintain the status quo first and think second, like every other cop, except that he's actually paid to think at some point.

          • Where was the detective in this scenario? They lied about damages to her vehicle to get an arrest warrant because they had no proof. They also refused to care that the license plate and color of the vehicle did not match. A nine year could have realized this didn't make sense. If a detective was paid to think here, he should be fired.

          • They don't want cops to think too hard though.

            https://abcnews.com/US/court-o... [abcnews.com]

        • Detectives aren't much better. I've been listening to true crime podcasts and the amount of cases where the police develop tunnel vision and arrest the wrong person is scary.

    • Re:Not Flock (Score:5, Insightful)

      by toutankh ( 1544253 ) on Monday October 05, 2026 @08:23AM (#66363474)

      The issue is that tools give people the impression that they can escape responsibility and therefore accountability. And if the law confirms that, we're all fucked. So there needs to be a severe sanction against someone, and I mean a real person, not a fine to a company. Otherwise we create dystopia one step at a time.

      • by flink ( 18449 )

        The issue is that tools give people the impression that they can escape responsibility and therefore accountability. And if the law confirms that, we're all fucked. So there needs to be a severe sanction against someone, and I mean a real person, not a fine to a company. Otherwise we create dystopia one step at a time.

        Cops never had much, if any, accountability to begin with. We've been fucked all along. Mass surveillance just allows us to be fucked at an industrial scale.

    • If you bring beer to an AA meeting repeatedly and tell everyone how great it is, you'll probably find at least a few folks fall off the wagon.

      Most will have the willpower to resist abusing but there are always a few who look for the quick fix.
    • And that's the whole point yeah, Flock isn't to blame, any false arrest due to tye use of flock cameras is up to the police for not doing their job, checking the images/videos provided by flock these flock cameras or any data provided by any automated system. It's just plain incompetence if they don't check properly before doing any arrest.
      • True. Eyewitness reports, a BOLO for 'Durango' out over the radio or network, and Liz gets this treatment anyways.

      • why do they care they never get into trouble for not doing there jobs. sure someone might sue bet they keep money aside just for that.
    • by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Monday October 05, 2026 @08:43AM (#66363512)
      Because they actively encourage police to believe that their matches are 100% accurate.

      Cops are dumb. This is on purpose. The job is extremely boring so they filter out more intelligent people because smart people get bored and leave the job after all that expensive training.

      So flock rolls in and tells these cops who already aren't the sharpest tool in the shed how accurate and amazing their software is. So the cops just take it for granted and arrest anyone the software tells them to arrest.

      I mean yeah we could hire smarter police but that would require a ton of police reform nobody is willing to do. It's just easier to get rid of the flock cameras and that's at least on the table.
      • Cops are dumb. This is on purpose. The job is extremely boring so they filter out more intelligent people because smart people get bored and leave the job after all that expensive training.

        No they just don't like cops who have a brain and can think instead of just following orders. When you want a force that just walks out and beats down people you don't want someone who has actual empathy / emotional intelligence / fill in word, the ability to reason independently, and who actually looks for information. Tehy certainly don't want a situation where police might prioritize say, something else over property crimes.

        I'm not going to claim that cops were Sherlock Holmes or actual geniuses, but

        • Cops are dumb. This is on purpose. The job is extremely boring so they filter out more intelligent people because smart people get bored and leave the job after all that expensive training.

          No they just don't like cops who have a brain and can think instead of just following orders. When you want a force that just walks out and beats down people you don't want someone who has actual empathy / emotional intelligence / fill in word, the ability to reason independently, and who actually looks for information. Tehy certainly don't want a situation where police might prioritize say, something else over property crimes. I'm not going to claim that cops were Sherlock Holmes or actual geniuses, but we (America in particular) prioritized the ability to blindly follow orders.

          Spotted the 2 privileged /. posters who have never been to a bad neighborhood before!, hence your simplistic and childish view of police officers. You sound like children demanding no one should ever get shots because needles are ouchies! The intellect of the average police officer is due to it being a blue collar profession with low pay. The smarter ones go into different branches, like the FBI, DHS, etc. A police officer's primary function in the legal system is to get a suspect in front of a judge, wh

          • Who is making mindless rants about Flock? People who have never felt threatened by crime and maybe some fucked up weirdos who are either casual criminals or secretly aspire to be ones.

            Thank you for showing us that your lens is cracked.

            Pervasive surveillance is antithetical to a Free Society. Period.

            • Who is making mindless rants about Flock? People who have never felt threatened by crime and maybe some fucked up weirdos who are either casual criminals or secretly aspire to be ones.

              Thank you for showing us that your lens is cracked.

              Pervasive surveillance is antithetical to a Free Society. Period.

              Concerns about a free society is a luxury cared for by those who are in danger. I guarantee you those fearing for their life walking home at night aren't concerned about a free society and being a pawn in your battle for your ideals. Your simplistic mottos are cold comforts for the moms burying their sons because they were at the wrong place at the wrong time. Life is messy and complicated. You're not even wrong....your ideals are noble, but the callous disregard for those protected by law enforcement i

              • Concerns about a free society is a luxury cared for by those who are in danger. I guarantee you those fearing for their life walking home at night aren't concerned about a free society and being a pawn in your battle for your ideals. Your simplistic mottos are cold comforts for the moms burying their sons because they were at the wrong place at the wrong time. Life is messy and complicated. You're not even wrong....your ideals are noble, but the callous disregard for those protected by law enforcement is not.

                You mean kind of like how Flock (and to be fair other ALPR companies) seem to call the police for a favor when anyone points a camera in their direction?

                https://www.atlantanewsfirst.c... [atlantanewsfirst.com]

          • Chicago? LOL... I used to live in Oakland. And yes, even in high-crime areas, the police are part of the problem more often than they are part of the soluiton. And no... letting them stomp all over peoples' civil liberties and the constitution in general does NOT make for a safe and civil city; otherwise Oakland would have been a paragon of law, order, and prosperity for the last 20 years.

            • Chicago? LOL... I used to live in Oakland. And yes, even in high-crime areas, the police are part of the problem more often than they are part of the soluiton. And no... letting them stomp all over peoples' civil liberties and the constitution in general does NOT make for a safe and civil city; otherwise Oakland would have been a paragon of law, order, and prosperity for the last 20 years.

              Chicago and Oakland have approx the same murder rate, but Chicago is a HUGE city geographically, including northern parts which are affluent suburbs. I lived on the South Side of Chicago, which has twice the population of Oakland and over 4x the murder rate. I heard gunfire nightly during the summer. Everyone in a high crime neighborhood wants BETTER police. And any sharp tool can be abused in the wrong hands, but I will wager if you polled Oakland residents, a majority would want ALPR technology if you

              • Yeah... You know what happens when you call the police about gang activity down by i-drive or fruitvale BART?

                1) They'l not show up in time to help. They pretty much never do. Either it's "All officers are responding to other calls." or a single squad car's "officers" simply refuse to go without a second or even third car along with them because they're too chickenshit to show up except with overwhelming force.

                2) Since they won't be there in time to stop whatever gang activity they were called for; they

              • by Khyber ( 864651 )

                "Those of us who worry about our safety are less concerned."

                "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety"

          • Spotted the 2 privileged /. posters who have never been to a bad neighborhood before!, hence your simplistic and childish view of police officers. You sound like children demanding no one should ever get shots because needles are ouchies!

            Wrong person to put that out to man. I grew up, QUITE LITERALLY, on the wrong side of the tracks. Yes when "wrong side of the tracks" was a literal thing. When "salt and pepper" teams existed for that reason. What you call a "bad neighborhood" was just home. Also it wasn't like the "bad" part of the neighborhood wasn't accentuated by the powers that be to ensure that as few people as possible got ahead and out.

            The intellect of the average police officer is due to it being a blue collar profession with low pay. The smarter ones go into different branches, like the FBI, DHS, etc. A police officer's primary function in the legal system is to get a suspect in front of a judge, who is the expert on innocence of guilt. The majority of police never draw their weapon nor face any danger from anything more threatening than traffic. If you're making such STUPID arguments, I'll wager your cops haven't had their life endangered recently.

            You have a rather ignorant view of how police, even the judicial system itself, works. The pay i

          • by pla ( 258480 )
            If we eliminated the second and fourth through eighth amendments to the US constitution, Uncle Sam would have a much easier time solving crimes. Nobody is disputing that. We as a society, however, have deemed it unacceptable for jackbooted thugs to kick down our - your - doors at any time without due process protections. We would prefer some crimes go unsolved over living in a constant state of fear toward an uncontrollable police state.

            If you live in a high-crime area, I have some bad news for you - The
          • I was going to mention the incredible size of the grain of salt necessary to accept the Flock CEO's numbers for crimes solved, as well as the definition of "crime". Before doing that, though, the company should probably settle on a number. 1,000,000 per year =/= 1,000 per day (365,000 per year) =/= 2800 per week (about 145,000 per year). Almost an order of magnitude range for those numbers. How many were murders or kidnappings vs how many were driving with expired tags? I'd also like to see how many actual
      • I dunno where you live, but police around where I live (and for at least a 100 mile radius) do not think their jobs are boring, unless you think the risk of a bullet boring a hole in your body is 'boring'.

        Repetitive? Yeah, domestic violence, homeless overdoses, e-moto kid stupidity, and random-ish shootings, rinse and repeat.

      • by Zak3056 ( 69287 )

        Because they actively encourage police to believe that their matches are 100% accurate.

        Tell me you didn't read the fucking article without telling me you didn't read the fucking article.

        No, Flock did not indicate a 100% match, the alleged 'detective' queried for "all dodge durangos" in a given area and chose one that was a different color than the vehicle reported in the accident... which had no damage on it. This is, 100%, on the cop and not Flock.

      • by Anonymous Coward

        Suppose I tell these dumb cops that I'm a psychic. "I have a vision of rsilvergun picking up a phaser and murdering Captain Kirk."

        If the cops act on my bullshit information, you don't think that's the cops' fault? I'm a whackjob (someone who think they're psychic), so I have the "it's not a lie if you believe it" defense. The cops don't.

    • Re:Not Flock (Score:5, Informative)

      by Registered Coward v2 ( 447531 ) on Monday October 05, 2026 @09:54AM (#66363642)

      I saw part of the testimony. This all comes down to human over-aggressiveness—not even mistakes.

      The detective used Flock to look for all Dodge Durangos within a radius of the accident. They located her at her apartment. So far, so good. But her car is a different color than what eyewitnesses said. Other details did not match up with eyewitness accounts. There was NO damage to her vehicle, but they arrested her anyway. The detective doubled down and the police continued there prosecution of her.

      I'm no fan of Flock, but in this case it's simply bad police.

      Correct. Flock provided data for teh cops to review and make informed decisions. Part of the problem is often pressure ot close cases, so an easy arrest is one way to do that, which then points to poor leadership who wants good stats. We can argue all day about Flok's role, and personally I am against Flock's use without very strict guardrails (which will never be imposed), but this is simply shoddy police work.

      • flock is used by some of the dumbest people in the world the police. they filter out anyone smart to enough to acully question something and just blind dumb followers of orders.
    • by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

      I saw part of the testimony. This all comes down to human over-aggressivenessâ"not even mistakes.

      The detective used Flock to look for all Dodge Durangos within a radius of the accident. They located her at her apartment. So far, so good. But her car is a different color than what eyewitnesses said. Other details did not match up with eyewitness accounts. There was NO damage to her vehicle, but they arrested her anyway. The detective doubled down and the police continued there prosecution of her.

      I'm no

    • Let's not put tools into the hands of people who abuse them. At least not without more significant safeguards and better transparency than we have today.

    • Good Guys with Tracking and Guns, obviously.

    • Same. The other case in the summary has exactly the same issue:

      "Florida was also the site of another Flock-related news story. ("Florida Deputy Allegedly Used Flock Cameras to Stalk 17-Year-Old Girl, Visiting Her at Work 9 Times".) The officer "was charged with official misconduct and accessing computer electronic devices without authority — both are third-degree felonies. In Florida, if he's found guilty on both charges, he could be sentenced to up to 10 years in prison."

      "Americans have no ide

    • by Marful ( 861873 )
      When cops get a FLOCK hit, they seem to shut the rest of their brain off and think they got their suspect and fail to do any actual corroborative investigation.

      But this idea that we must endure this police bullshit because "flock catches criminals" is nonsense. You know what would also catch more criminals? Not having any rights. Cops entering your home and searching everything of yours any time they feel like it. But that is absurd. So using it as justification is likewise absurd.

      Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom: it is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves

      William Pitt, the You

    • same crap happen to me once. someone robbed some pizza place. i got a nice aggressive pull over cops nearly hitting my car and so on. taring up my car in a unlawful search only to find out not only did they have the wrong car. it was the wrong color and different model. yea went from over aggressive to please dont sue us.
    • shes getting a payday. about 3 things a atterny is gonna list.
  • The Police officers and detectives need to have a public karma score based on being correct or making mistakes. They should be fired when the score goes negative.
    • Who will score them, other police? The basic issue is that police, prosecutors, etc. are judged on how many arrests or convictions they get, not on how many are justified. It is more important to them to make an arrest in a case then to actually identify the guilty party.
      • It would be as simple as an indepedent administrator that looks at public records. If someone is wrongfully arrested then the detective and judge who ordered the arrest get their score lowered. If a kid can create an automatic tracking bot for Elon Musk flights they can easily track wrongful arrests.
        • Lower the score? Fuck that noise.

          Any cop who decides it's he is prerogative to stop, arrest, "detain", interrogate, approach, or otherwise darken the day of anyone who did not, in fact... and I mean objectively true FACT, not some made-up narrative or demented fever dream... commit the crime, should a instantly on a one-way trip up the river for assault and kidnapping. And any DA or judge who goes along with an attempted frame-up should join them on a conspiracy charge.

          "Close enough for government work."

      • no department wants a smart cops they would question way to mutch
    • Start with ending qualified immunity and require a degree. My wife's hair stylist required more training time than the cops.

      • People with degrees dont become cops. They know its a thankless job. The future will be robo cops
      • by Zak3056 ( 69287 )

        Qualified Immunity is a red herring. Don't get me wrong, it's a whole cloth creation of the Supreme Court that flies in the face of section 1983 and Congress should have fixed this problem decades ago, but QI is, first of all, limited to civil rather than criminal liability and, secondly, every police force in the country indemnifies its officers in the event of civil litigation that arises out of their actions.

        If you want a real fix here, it's holding police accountable. Not throwing up hands and crying

  • They put her a cell for 86 hours and in solitary? I'm no fan of Flock, but they have shown us just how lawlessly police will act when given the chance. Perhaps the cameras should be in the police station.
  • and I got pulled over in late August because the officer "couldn't read my license plate". Admittedly, it was faded because the car sat for a few years when I was out-of-state. I'm sure there was an ALPR involved because a human with average vision could still read the plate. I'm convinced it was one of these cameras that "couldn't read the plate", not the human. Got a ticket for that.
    • A ticket, or a fix-it ticket? I don't know how the fix-it tickets work in Florida - if they're anything like California, it's a matter of fixing the issue and then paying an admin fee: ~$25 for a replacement plate, ~$25 admin fee, plus your time getting an officer at a local office to sign off. Based on the number of issues around my home (Los Angeles area) I doubt fix it tickets are very common... it's like shooting fish in a barrel. Then again, I also wonder how often tickets are more liberally given to t

    • Wait... the license plate provided by the state couldn't survive being outside in the sun, and that's YOUR fault???
  • by Inglix the Mad ( 576601 ) on Monday October 05, 2026 @09:24AM (#66363584)
    because they encourage laziness. They also encourage a whole host of petty, or even outright dangerous, behaviors in people who aren't always the most stable. ON top of that it doesn't matter if it's the government, or a private company, building a database of everyone's movements: THIS IS STILL A TERRIBLE IDEA!

    I'd argue it's even worse if a private company does it because how long will it take for a third party (corporations) to start abusing it? When they start selling access to corporations, of course.

    What? Did you think this would remain a government only tool?
  • "Americans have no idea who's looking at that information, or why it has to be collected in the first place," U.S. Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer said Sunday, adding "They deserve to know."

    You know what Americans also deserve to know, oh exalted lawmaker of yore? Why the fuck you're pretending Mass Surveillance just fell off the back of the Flock truck when you've been around long enough to have voted for Clipper Chip kickbacks in your 401k and name your grandkids Prism and Orwell.

    There's a difference between a Politician and a Representative. If you cannot uphold the Constitution and Bill of Rights to protect the very citizenry you're elected to Represent, then you are in the wrong as a l

    • by Zak3056 ( 69287 )

      Yeah, Schumer of all people whining about the surveillance state is absurd. Voted for the PATRIOT Act in 2001. Railed against Snowden a decade later. But, sure, Chuck, we totally believe you're on the side of the American People here, rather than simply being smart enough to realize that supporting Flock is a fast track to being voted out of office in the current climate (and a bipartisan one at that).

  • If the cops receive an anonymous tip that CowboyNeal is an insensitive clod, and then decide to arrest him without checking out any of the evidence, I blame the cops. There's plenty to bitch about with Flock but "the cops don't care about doing their job" isn't one of them. That's a cop problem.

    Don't treat any stupid robots as somehow "better" than an anonymous tip called in from a payphone. It's just, like, something's opinion, man.

  • by Arrogant-Bastard ( 141720 ) on Monday October 05, 2026 @10:34AM (#66363704)
    We need cameras and microphones set up outside their homes, livestreaming everything constantly. We need to follow them wherever they go and post audio/video/stills from that too, along with their exact locations. We need to run facial recognition on them and everyone they encounter. We need to do everything possible to ensure that they have absolutely no privacy, ever. This includes the children because, after all, they're doing it to our children -- why should theirs be exempt?

    This is what Flock is doing to us; it's only fair to return the favor.
  • by dskoll ( 99328 ) on Monday October 05, 2026 @10:37AM (#66363712) Homepage

    Flock being misused or abused; a botched execution in Tennessee; Trump continuing to block CNN despite a court order... you might almost think there's something wrong with the American legal system.

  • by kackle ( 910159 )
    Don't blame the tool, blame the tools.
  • by pulpo88 ( 6987500 ) on Monday October 05, 2026 @10:58AM (#66363746)

    Because if it wasn't for Flock we wouldn't be here in the first place, and this whole nightmare... would not have kicked off.

    Because if it wasn't for police we wouldn't be here in the first place, and this whole nightmare... would not have kicked off.
    Because if it wasn't for cameras we wouldn't be here in the first place, and this whole nightmare... would not have kicked off.
    Because if it wasn't for cars we wouldn't be here in the first place, and this whole nightmare... would not have kicked off.
    Because if it wasn't for computers we wouldn't be here in the first place, and this whole nightmare... would not have kicked off.
    Because if it wasn't for electromagnetism we wouldn't be here in the first place, and this whole nightmare... would not have kicked off.

  • by FictionPimp ( 712802 ) on Monday October 05, 2026 @11:47AM (#66363832) Homepage

    I like that she is suing the police, but she needs to sue flock as well. Pain and suffering, libel, whatever you can find to make it stick. I think libel may fit very well here, "falsely accusing someone of criminal conduct is one of the classic categories of defamation per se, where reputational harm can be presumed rather than requiring the plaintiff to prove every dollar of resulting damage".

    Claiming that I was the perp in a hit and run and placing me in jail has real harm and they published it to the police force.

    Sure: "This plate was observed near a location under investigation." isprobably not defamatory by itself if it is factually true. However, "Registered owner is wanted for burglary." feels very defamatory with real reputatinal and potentially monetary damages. I'd want my lawyer to investigate defamation/libel along with negligence and potentially other constitutional or statutory claims depending on who supplied the data.

    • The cop(s) that LIED in the arrest report and said her car had damage matching the damage that would have been caused by the hit-and-run should be in jail!
    • she will sue that department for sure. maybe they will decided flock is costing them to much money then
  • by SlashbotAgent ( 6477336 ) on Monday October 05, 2026 @12:18PM (#66363896)

    13 days in jail, for no fault of her own. Outrageous!

    Somewhat similarly; I know someone who was arrested and jailed for no fault of their own. They were out on bail in a day, BUT... It cost them $10k for a lawyer and bail. All for the cops to say 'Whoops. Our bad.' But, he's still out $10k, still has an arrest record, and still has the trauma from it all. And all for no valid reason and no fault of his own.

    The system is broken.

  • The current massive influx of news against Flock cameras just seems bizarrely heavy-handed. It's everywhere, all the time, and seems like a manufactured crisis. Seriously? Don't we have anything else to worry about? Possibly the insane war in Iran, the insane President, inflation, the insane President, the Epstein files, the insane President, gas prices? Possibly the insane President? Maybe the living corpse of Mitch Connell? Possibly the insane President? I'm just waiting to hear he's decided to change h
  • Because she's gonna be rich pretty soon.

  • It is not Flock. It is stupid human users.
  • 1. All license or face matches done by AI need to be verified by a human being before acting on them.

    2. I warrant signed by a judge should be required to track anybody by telling the system to alert you every time their license plate goes by a camera.

  • It's a poor carpenter who blames his tools.

No hardware designer should be allowed to produce any piece of hardware until three software guys have signed off for it. -- Andy Tanenbaum

Working...