Flock surveillance cameras are “political theatre” says NARSOL
By Michael McDaniel . . . Near the Litchfield Church in September 2022, a car set off an automated license plate reader system alarm. The camera system, called Flock, told police the vehicle was stolen.
Police scrambled to find the driver in the historically affluent town. Once they reached the panicked
driver, they discovered the Flock had strayed.
“The Flock camera read the plate wrong as AZ:074A45G when the plate actually read AZ:D74A5G,”
wrote the officer, in the report.
It wasn’t the first time Litchfield Park [Arizona] had this happen. The December before saw Flock artificial
intelligence make the same mistake. It also correctly alerted the police of a stolen vehicle where the
plate was erroneously entered into the statewide MVD system that same month. The driver was
detained and then released.
The system is connected to the National Crime Information Center, an FBI database. Any officer with
access to Flock can set up an alert based on subjective suspicion. Additionally, police can be alerted if a
suspect enters another jurisdiction with Flock cameras. . . .
Most cities in Maricopa County and some in Pinal County have Flock cameras. For those that don’t, state or county law enforcement agencies deploy cameras to areas indiscriminately, leading to
concerns over Fourth Amendment privacy interests, misuse and politically-based monitoring. . . .
“Sex offenders vehicles ‘crossing’ a flock camera automatically alert the system. Leaving or entering,”
said Litchfield Park City Manager Matthew Williams. . . .
Much can be said about how a government treats the “lowest” of its free individuals, according to
National Association for Rational Sexual Offense Laws, or NARSOL.
“Registered sexual offenders in our society are considered the ‘lowest of the low,’ but all citizens, even
those who have committed a past felony but who are not wanted for any new offense, are entitled to
the same protections,” said Sandy Rozek, a representative from NARSOL. “Just by virtue of being on
the registry, registrants do not lose the rights afforded to other citizens. This is an instance of towns and counties competing to impose harsher and harsher surveillance measures on registrants, all in the
name of public safety, but which are unnecessary intrusions on people’s lives, are based on irrational
fear, have no effect on public safety, and are nothing but political theatre. We should all be troubled by
the government surveilling law-abiding citizens as they are just trying to go about their lives.”
Read the full piece here at the Daily Independent.
I’ve said it many times, SOR is the foundation of federal electronic domestic surveillance. Cameras are fine, but its the collection and storage of images ( data) that matters.
So without the database in the equation cameras are mostly harmless. I do not think anyone can stop the people from operating a database mug book, but enslaving the human to their maintaining for life is another matter. Since when does involuntary servitude to a property not punishment. According to the 13th amendment involuntary servitude is punishment. Who would want the inherent servitude defined otherwise?
The purveyors, and only the purveyors.
the seemingly differientiated treatment of travelling citizens brings that bad ass indianna federal case to my shrivelling mind — tolle it like it is. i remain estatic.
but anyway …
Is 1984, big brother is watching and big brother is not fair or nice about it either.
Good point,
Private enterprise wrestling away that responsibility which constitutionally belongs to the people’s whole sovereignty. Regulation of the people’s belongs to the people’s themselves (gov) and not smaller private parties. The people are foolish enough to do so, and thereby elect fascism. The purveyors of database offer human dependency and not human independence! Convenience at the price of protection rackets.
One of the many scary parts of AI is the abuse of it by actors, “good” or “bad”. Its difficult to feel hopeful of the future with such technology and attitudes in place.
I don’t think anything will change unless the FLOCK camera usage can be attacked legally. No one cares if they specially track PFRs.That is viewed as innovative in our case.
Just like London, England, greater PHX area is becoming London of the west with these systems.
The fact that police can drop surveillance cameras anywhere at any time is troubling to me. I see them everywhere. The fact that they are present implies a back-end database where all data is collected and stored indefinitely. This should be troubling to everyone.
Domestic Terrorism. Period
The surveillance is happening, by any and all means. If not this way then that way, it seems that they always find a way to their end goal: a predatory system meant to intimidate people. It’s a complete and total waste of tax payer money, yet it easily gets the funding when the police and the law makers team up to produce those gut-wrenching presentations full of dramatic “reenactments” and scare tactics. Especially the National Crime Victims Farce, they sure did get everything they ever dreamed and hoped for. All it costed them was totally destroying the families of the accused and stripping them of any rights to decency.
Good job America!