There’s a new frontier in the national privacy debate that’s uniting people on the right and left, and it’s a tool that millions of Americans encounter every day without even realizing it.
Automatic license plate reader (ALPR) companies have been brought under scrutiny by lawmakers in Washington as privacy hawks warn that the growing sophistication of artificial intelligence (AI) technology is testing the bounds of what ALPR devices can legally learn about drivers on the road.
One company in particular, Flock Safety, has been taking hits in the media and political sphere as news of Flock cameras’ misuse — and occasional success — dominates headlines.
“There’s cameras everywhere, people know that, but if law enforcement has the ability to monitor the comings and goings of citizens, I think that’s wrong. I mean, we’re not the CCP, we’re not 1984 and an Orwellian society, and Americans have rights,” Rep. Greg Steube, R-Fla., told Fox News Digital.
LICENSE PLATE CAMERAS ARE TRACKING DRIVERS EVERYWHERE
He pointed to a recent incident in his district where a now-former Sarasota police officer was fired and arrested after being accused of misusing Flock camera technology, using it to spy on one particular license plate over 300 times.
“I don’t think you’re gonna be able to stop these cameras from being out there, but at the very least, there should be some type of legal parameters put in place to protect people’s Fourth Amendment rights,” he said.
ALPRs automatically capture and analyze vehicle and location data on public roads without drivers’ consent. Supporters have argued that it’s a critical tool for public safety that only collects minimal information, while opponents labeled it an alarming expansion of the mass surveillance state.
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Rep. Keith Self, R-Texas, told Fox News Digital, “These cameras are well beyond an automated license plate reader today. AI has made them so capable that they are now capable of facial recognition, of seeing what you’re doing inside your car. So it’s well beyond the license plate reader…that’s the problem. Technology has moved these beyond just looking at the back of a car.”
On the other side of the aisle, a spokesperson for progressive Rep. Delia Ramirez, D-Ill., pointed Fox News Digital to her recent comments responding to news that Flock was updating its oversight standards. Ramirez wrote on X, “Private tech companies have amassed record-breaking profits off our pain and the use of technology for mass surveillance is a threat to our democracy, civil liberties, and privacy. Congress must stop the ever-expanding surveillance state.”
The debate even exploded onto the campaign trail ahead of November’s midterm elections, where ALPRs join AI data centers as Big Tech’s big boogeymen.
“I oppose Flock’s mass surveillance technology, and I’ll stand with anyone in Congress, regardless of party, who wants to put limits on unchecked mass surveillance on the American people,” Will Lawrence, a Democrat running for the House in Michigan’s 7th Congressional District, told Fox News Digital.
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Abdul El-Sayed, the insurgent progressive Democratic nominee for Senate in Michigan, accused his opponent, former Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich., of supporting Flock cameras in a campaign video released on X.
“There’s been this mass proliferation of black cameras, any and everywhere, little cameras, watching your every move to collect information about you without you even noticing,” he said in the video. “If you believe, like me, that you shouldn’t just be surveilled because you’re driving along the street, then I hope I can earn your support.”
A spokesperson for Rogers told Fox News Digital that he “vehemently opposes unchecked use of Flock cameras to track law-abiding citizens. Security and liberty aren’t enemies. Good government protects both.”
Back on Capitol Hill, the furor over these cameras has prompted a flurry of legislative pushback.
Self is among the House lawmakers pushing bills aimed at the issue, along with Reps. Tim Burchett, R-Tenn., and Thomas Massie, R-Ky.
Steube told Fox News Digital that he’s also “looking at filing something at the national level,” and is sending a letter to Sarasota, Florida, officials threatening to withhold federal funding absent a promise of “reasonable restrictions” to “prevent the abuses that have happened right here in our backyard.”
Privacy and misuse concerns have sparked efforts across the country to cut ties with Flock specifically, from Lansing, Michigan, to Bernadillo County, New Mexico.
Flock is just one company of several that operate ALPRs, some of which have been used for years.
But the technology does have its benefits and has been used to stop crime.
Flock Safety founder and CEO Garrett Langley told Fox News’ “Saturday in America” that his technology has helped police find missing children at least twice, including after a recent carjacking in Atlanta. Flock has also said it does not use facial recognition and recently introduced new safety controls in response to the public backlash.
“When I think about legislation that calls for an outright ban, that’s like banning vehicles. That would never have made sense. Instead, what we did is we introduced laws against drunk driving. We introduced laws around seatbelts, laws around airbags,” Langley said. “What happens if law enforcement abuses this powerful technology today? It is too often that in Flock and in other technologies, there’s no regulation, there’s no accountability. And we think that’s wrong.”
Supporters of ALPRs like Flock cameras have held them up as a key crime-fighting tool, while agreeing that guardrails to prevent abuse would be helpful.
“I think it’s definitely a net positive. And I think that’s a very easy call… the use cases and the documented cases of these things being effective tools, I think, vastly outnumber the handful of cases of abuse and misuse that we’ve seen,” Rafael Mangual, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, told Fox News Digital. “The fact that some police officers will misuse their firearms, for example, to hurt people, is not a reason to take away all police officers’ firearms.”
Mangual said he disagreed with accusations of Fourth Amendment violations as well: “I think as of right now, these cameras can’t be used to do the sorts of things that courts have recognized require a warrant.”
Jim Pasco, executive director of the National Fraternal Order of Police, told Fox News Digital, “There’s an awful lot of new and still developing technology out there that’s very helpful to law enforcement and to enhancing public safety. That said, all of these systems need to be regulated to ensure that they aren’t abused.”
He also cautioned against making policy decisions in the heat of an election cycle.
“The most dangerous time of governance to have a crisis in is an even-numbered year, because elections are always held in even-numbered years. And I would say this problem and this year are no exception,” Pasco said. “There needs to be a very careful analysis of the benefits and the risks inherent in abuse and any action that’s taken should, if anything, enhance the potential for these systems being used for good and minimize the chances of abuse.”
“Let’s not throw out the baby with the bath water here.”
