What is Flock Safety ACTUALLY Selling... and To Who? (Isaac Botkin)
Sep 7, 2026
This outline was generated by an LLM from a transcript and may contain errors or inaccuracies. Prefer the original recording when available.
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Highlights:
This video is an argument against treating Flock Safety as the only issue in automated surveillance. The speaker’s core claim is that the real product being sold is not cameras but warrantless subscription access to a searchable database of people’s movements and other observable traits, marketed to law enforcement as fast, low-friction access and marketed to local officials and the public as a limited safety tool. The video frames that business model as a constitutional problem under the Fourth Amendment, with extended discussion of Supreme Court tracking cases and of what the speaker describes as contradictory sales pitches.
The most concrete examples cited are backlash and contract fallout: Florida reportedly removing Flock Safety cameras from the state highway system, Pflugerville, Texas uninstalling cameras after a public-records request showed 1.6 million outside queries by 469 agencies in 6 months, and Knox County, Tennessee ending a 140-camera contract after scrutiny of a $274,000 purchase allegedly split into $24,990 increments. Other notable threads include comparisons to Axon, Motorola, Ring, AT&T, Verizon, Apple, Google, Meta, evidence.com, and Redflex; discussion of demos using live data; and cited cases including United States v. Knotts (transcribed as “Cairo”), United States v. Jones, Carpenter v. United States, and Chatrie v. United States.
New Business / Agenda Items 0:00
0:00 Framing the issue: opposition should target the surveillance model, not just one vendor
- 0:00 The speaker says this was a bad week for Flock Safety, citing Florida’s reported ban from the state highway system, several county contract cancellations, and more reported cases of mistakes, misuse, and data leaks.
- 0:14 The main warning is against assuming the fight is over if Flock Safety weakens; the speaker argues the underlying problem is a movement database and that other firms can provide the same function with similar data practices.
- 1:01 The video’s stated structure: explain Flock Safety’s value proposition, connect that to the Fourth Amendment, and then examine the legal gray areas the company is said to rely on so viewers can recognize the same model in competing products.
2:26 What Flock is “actually selling” 2:26
- 2:26 The speaker argues Flock Safety is not meaningfully selling cameras, because cameras are already ubiquitous across businesses, homes, police body cameras, dash cams, and phones.
- 3:02 The speaker also argues the company is not mainly selling access to footage, because victims routinely bring footage to police and additional evidence is commonly available from phones and social platforms.
- 3:29 Automated license plate readers are described as old and common technology rather than Flock Safety’s unique innovation; the claimed differentiator is the database of movements built from that input.
- 3:50 The central claim is that the company’s business model is a searchable movement database, not the hardware itself, and that the same concern would apply to other location-data ecosystems.
4:03 Comparison to telecom, phone, and advertising data 4:03
- 4:03 The speaker notes that similar movement databases already exist through Verizon, AT&T, auto manufacturers, phone makers, and advertisers such as Meta.
- 4:34 The distinction drawn is that those datasets have at least some existing legal protections and usually require warrants or narrowed legal process before law enforcement can obtain them.
- 5:06 The argument presented is that because homes and workplaces are private, courts have recognized warrant requirements for obtaining broad location data from those providers.
5:37 Constitutional argument and claimed loophole 5:37
- 5:37 The speaker’s core legal argument is that Flock Safety offers substantially the same kind of movement information without a warrant, by claiming the data comes from cameras in public places.
- 6:07 United States v. Knotts is cited as the foundational pro-tracking case: if an officer could observe conduct from a public street, the speaker says Flock Safety relies on that principle to justify camera collection at that location.
- 6:42 United States v. Jones is cited as contrary authority, with the point that extended GPS tracking of a vehicle on public roads still requires a warrant.
- 7:02 Carpenter v. United States is cited for the proposition that people retain a reasonable expectation of privacy in a comprehensive record of their physical movements.
- 7:20 The speaker argues Flock Safety’s product matches that description—a comprehensive record of physical movements over time sold to law-enforcement customers—despite the company’s claimed distinctions.
- 7:50 The criticism is that the company is trying to satisfy the narrow letter of public-observation doctrine while violating the spirit of constitutional privacy limits.
- 8:10 The speaker characterizes company language as semantic narrowing: selling “access” rather than the record itself, “sharing information” rather than “sharing data,” and “queries” rather than searches.
- 8:47 The practical objection is that historically such access required a warrant and public paper trail, while the subscription model is presented as instantaneous, low-oversight access with little friction.
9:44 Alleged contradiction between public assurances and law-enforcement sales pitch 9:44
- 9:44 The speaker says company spokespeople publicly answer privacy concerns by promising safeguards, caution, and protection.
- 9:55 That is contrasted with the alleged pitch to law enforcement: broad access, speed, no delays, and no warrant requirement.
- 10:06 The video frames this as a “bait and switch” or two-track messaging strategy—one message to reassure the public and a different one to appeal to police agencies.
10:25 Pflugerville, Texas example 10:25
- 10:25 The speaker cites Pflugerville, Texas, saying the town installed 28 cameras for a population just under 70,000.
- 10:34 Local officials were allegedly told they owned and controlled their data and that no outside party could search it without explicit authorization.
- 10:40 In 6 months, the local police department reportedly ran about 5,000 searches on local residents.
- 10:53 A public-records request under the Freedom of Information Act is said to have produced audit files showing 1.6 million outside queries from 469 law-enforcement agencies nationwide that the town had not authorized.
- 11:17 The speaker emphasizes the scale by comparing 1.6 million searches against a town of 70,000, arguing this implies repeated searches against ordinary residents.
- 11:30 Reported outcome: Pflugerville is said to be uninstalling the cameras.
11:36 Knox County, Tennessee example 11:36
- 11:36 The speaker cites Knox County as having had a contract for 140 cameras that was ended that week by a unanimous commission vote.
- 11:48 A sheriff’s office deputy, named in the transcript as Jarnell/Arnell, is said to have signed a $274,000 Flock Safety contract.
- 12:01 The speaker argues the notable figure is not the total but the repeated purchase increments of $24,990, described as exactly $10 below a $25,000 threshold that would have triggered county-commission review.
- 12:17 The allegation is that this structure let the purchases proceed without alerting commissioners until the total reached 140 cameras.
- 12:25 Glenn Jacobs is referenced as county mayor who was said to be angered when he learned of the purchases.
- 12:41 The speaker says the deputy and 10 other sheriff’s office members were indicted over more than $300,000 in misused funds, while noting that those indictments did not appear to involve the Flock Safety system itself.
- 13:02 The speaker stops short of alleging incentives or instructions from the vendor, saying that would be speculation.
13:16 Chicago / Redflex comparison and interchangeability concern 13:16
- 13:16 As a historical comparison, the speaker references a Chicago scandal in which a city council member allegedly accepted inducements related to a $130 million Redflex camera contract.
- 13:34 Even after that contract ended, the cameras reportedly stayed in place and service continued under another vendor and software platform without losing a day.
- 13:56 The lesson drawn is that if the hardware and data pipeline remain useful, one surveillance vendor can be replaced by another with little operational disruption.
- 14:03 The speaker notes some people speculate Flock Safety could eventually serve as a scapegoat while the infrastructure persists under new ownership or branding, though the speaker says he does not personally believe that is happening now.
- 14:26 The speaker instead describes Flock Safety as still having significant momentum, citing an estimated $8 billion valuation and only about 200 cancelled contracts to date.
15:02 Competitors and industry consolidation 15:02
- 15:02 The speaker says attention should remain on any company selling warrantless access to data that traditionally required a warrant, not just Flock Safety.
- 15:04 Axon is highlighted as a significant comparable vendor.
- 15:11 The speaker says he recently saw Axon marketing a similar product line at a trade show.
- 15:32 A past Flock Safety blog post is cited for the claim that Axon was an early investor in Flock Safety and that the companies shared software technology and some collected data.
- 15:42 evidence.com is identified as an Axon platform into which Flock Safety API data had automatically transferred.
- 15:55 The speaker presents this as normal tech-industry behavior and as part of a larger pattern of platform integration and consolidation.
- 16:00 The body-camera market is used as an example: Axon and VieVu are described as major competitors until Safariland Group sold VieVu to Axon, after which hardware and support were consolidated into the main Axon platform.
- 16:32 The conclusion is that surveillance capabilities can survive company turnover because contracts, hardware, support systems, and software can be integrated or absorbed.
16:49 Fourth Amendment text and historical purpose 16:49
- 16:49 The speaker reads the Fourth Amendment text and centers the requirements of probable cause, oath or affirmation, and particular description of the place searched and persons or things seized.
- 17:17 The amendment is explained in historical context as a reaction against British writs of assistance, described as broad, indefinite search authorities over large geographic areas with little oversight.
- 17:57 The speaker argues that modern mass-tracking systems recreate the same type of generalized search power that the amendment was written to prevent.
18:03 Recent case law and privacy implications of movement data 18:03
- 18:03 The speaker cites Chatrie v. United States as a recent case in which location data held by a third party such as Google was still treated as Fourth Amendment-protected information requiring a warrant.
- 18:31 The speaker says that decision is recent enough that it has not yet materially affected Flock Safety litigation but likely will.
- 18:38 The practical privacy argument is that close tracking of a vehicle reveals private facts even when travel occurs in public: home, workplace, church attendance, political activity, voting, medical visits, and child-related routines.
- 19:24 The speaker argues that this makes even license-plate tracking highly invasive because it enables inference of constitutionally sensitive activities.
19:31 Search capabilities beyond license plates 19:31
- 19:31 The speaker says Flock Safety’s system contains more than plate data and vehicle movements, based on public-records materials sent to him by others.
- 20:18 He says audit logs show sales teams demoing the platform for prospective buyers using live private data rather than simulated data, before contracts are signed.
- 20:43 Search examples allegedly used in demos include “vehicle with a political sticker,” “truck with a Trump flag,” “person wearing a mask,” and “person holding a weapon.”
- 21:01 The speaker argues that searches for weapon-carrying people in open-carry jurisdictions are not ordinary crime-fighting uses but demographic or constitutional-status profiling.
- 21:16 The broader point is that the demo queries suggest image- and person-based attributes are searchable, not only plates, which in the speaker’s view widens both privacy and misuse risks.
21:39 Competing sales pitches to police and to local governments 21:39
- 21:39 The video returns to the claim that Flock Safety gives one pitch to law enforcement—powerful broad search with speed and no warrant friction—and a second pitch to commissioners, municipalities, and the public—small, limited, cautious, safe use.
- 22:05 The speaker says the overlap between the two pitches is the promise of “safety,” especially the claim that subscribing to the service lowers crime.
- 22:13 The speaker argues some commissioners may sincerely believe that message rather than seeing the system as mass surveillance.
22:25 Tennessee commissioner anecdote 22:25
- 22:25 The speaker recounts a secondhand anecdote from Tennessee about a county commissioner who voted for Flock Safety camera installation and then placed a camera on his own dead-end road where only he lived.
- 22:42 The point drawn is not just self-interest but that some local officials may genuinely think of the product as a personal or neighborhood security camera rather than a regional surveillance node.
23:09 Why the “crime reduction” pitch matters legally 23:09
- 23:09 The speaker argues the public-safety sales pitch is legally important because Flock Safety’s constitutional defense depends on portraying itself as a private third party, not an arm of law enforcement.
- 23:24 At the same time, the company’s practical sales case to counties and municipalities is said to depend on presenting the service as an indispensable law-enforcement tool placed in carefully chosen enforcement locations.
- 23:50 The speaker describes that as a deliberately constructed gray area requiring both propositions to be accepted at once: private enough to avoid warrant constraints, but law-enforcement-centered enough to justify deployment and spending.
- 24:04 He ties this back to broader concerns about blurred institutional boundaries and loss of clear jurisdictional limits.
24:28 Claimed principles to defend 24:28
- 24:28 The speaker says two structural protections are at stake: the Bill of Rights limits on government power, especially the Fourth Amendment, and the separation of powers and jurisdictions among institutions.
- 24:46 The argument is that mass-surveillance business models seek to erode both by bypassing rights protections and by dissolving traditional barriers between public authority and private data intermediaries.
- 25:07 The speaker’s recommended response is to oppose any company or service that opens these loopholes, whether it is Flock Safety, Axon, Motorola, or a future entrant.
Announcements 25:31
- 25:31 The speaker says Flock Safety also has other red flags, including changing claims about what the hardware can do, changing record-retention and access rules, and claiming crime reduction despite what he says is contrary evidence.
- 25:56 A request is made for viewer input on future topics, including technical dangers of mass surveillance and whether frictionless systems make officers lazier or more prone to mistakes.
- 26:19 The closing call to action is to oppose warrantless, limitless surveillance systems and to keep focus on the model rather than only one brand.
Adjournment 26:51
- 26:51 End-credit teaser shows what the speaker says is a real older model camera, suggesting future analysis of hardware.
Key figures and statistics
| Figure | Type | Context / topic | Timestamp |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2026 | Year | Speaker says cameras are ubiquitous “in the year of our Lord 2026” | 2:31 |
| 50 million | Estimate | Claimed number of commercial cameras in regular businesses | 2:34 |
| Almost half | Share | Claimed share of American homes with Ring or other doorbell cameras | 2:38 |
| 1970s | Era | Automated license plate readers described as technology dating to the 1970s | 3:31 |
| 1984 | Year | Year cited for United States v. Knotts public-tracking case | 6:11 |
| 2012 | Year | Year cited for United States v. Jones | 6:44 |
| 2018 | Year | Year cited for Carpenter v. United States | 7:02 |
| 28 | Camera count | Pflugerville, Texas installation count | 10:25 |
| 70,000 | Population | Approximate Pflugerville population | 10:29 |
| 6 months | Time period | Local period during which Pflugerville police reportedly had cameras operating | 10:40 |
| 5,000 | Search count | Approximate local PD searches/queries in Pflugerville over six months | 10:42 |
| 1.6 million | Query count | Outside queries on Pflugerville data revealed by records request | 11:01 |
| 469 | Agency count | Law-enforcement agencies said to have queried Pflugerville data | 11:06 |
| 20 times | Per-capita comparison | Speaker’s estimate of how often each resident would be searched if queries covered the full town | 11:27 |
| 140 | Camera count | Knox County contract camera total | 11:39 |
| $274,000 | Contract value | Total Knox County Flock Safety contract cited | 11:52 |
| $24,990 | Purchase amount | Repeated order size alleged in Knox County purchases | 12:04 |
| $10 | Difference | Amount said to be under the review threshold | 12:10 |
| $25,000 | Threshold | Commission-review trigger amount alleged in Knox County | 12:13 |
| 10 | Personnel count | Additional sheriff’s office members indicted besides the deputy | 12:42 |
| $300,000 | Misused funds | Amount tied to indictments, said not to involve the camera system itself | 12:45 |
| $130 million | Contract value | Chicago Redflex camera contract cited as historical comparison | 13:28 |
| $8 billion | Valuation | Claimed Flock Safety company valuation | 14:26 |
| 200 | Contract count | Approximate number of cancelled Flock Safety contracts cited | 14:31 |
External vendors, brands, and software
| Name | Type | Context / topic | Timestamp |
|---|---|---|---|
| Flock Safety | Company | Central subject; speaker argues it sells warrantless access to movement data rather than merely cameras | 0:01 |
| Ring | Brand | Example of widely used home camera/doorbell surveillance products | 2:38 |
| Verizon | Company | Example of cell provider holding user location data | 4:08 |
| AT&T | Company | Example of cell provider holding user location data; later referenced in Carpenter discussion | 4:10 |
| Meta | Company | Example of advertiser able to derive location data | 4:26 |
| Apple | Company | Named in discussion of geofence warrants and location-data demands | 4:46 |
| Company | Named in geofence warrant discussion and later in Chatrie location-data example | 4:47 | |
| Axon | Company | Presented as a comparable surveillance vendor and early Flock Safety investor | 9:12 |
| Motorola | Company | Mentioned as another company that could provide similar surveillance capabilities | 9:13 |
| Redflex | Company | Historical comparison in Chicago camera-contract scandal | 13:28 |
| evidence.com | Software | Axon platform said to receive Flock Safety API data | 15:42 |
| API | Software | Flock Safety API referenced in discussion of data transfer into evidence.com | 15:45 |
| VieVu | Company | Body-camera competitor later sold to Axon | 16:05 |
| Safariland Group | Company | Company said to have sold VieVu to Axon | 16:17 |
Laws and policies
| Citation / name | Level | Type | Context / topic | Timestamp |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fourth Amendment | Federal | Law | Core argument that movement-data access requires warrants and particularized suspicion | 1:09 |
| United States v. Knotts | Federal | Law | Cited by the speaker as the case Flock Safety relies on for public-location tracking | 6:07 |
| United States v. Jones | Federal | Law | Cited as requiring a warrant for extended vehicle GPS tracking on public roads | 6:42 |
| Carpenter v. United States | Federal | Law | Cited for reasonable expectation of privacy in comprehensive movement records | 7:02 |
| Freedom of Information Act | Federal | Law | Public-records request used to obtain Pflugerville audit files | 10:55 |
| Bill of Rights | Federal | Law | Cited as the larger constitutional structure limiting government action | 16:54 |
| Writs of assistance | Federal | Law | Historical British general-search instruments discussed as the abuse the Fourth Amendment was designed to prevent | 17:33 |
| Chatrie v. United States | Federal | Law | Recent case cited for the rule that third-party-held location data still requires a warrant | 18:05 |
0:00
This has been a bad week for flock
0:02
safety. Florida has banned their cameras
0:04
from the state highway system. Several
0:06
counties have canled their contracts and
0:08
more and more cases of mistakes uh
0:11
misuse of data and leaks uh have been uh
0:14
found. So, is flock safety dead in the
0:17
water? Did we win? Is it time for us to
0:20
uh relax or should we double down on our
0:22
privacy rights? Well, in the last video,
0:25
I said don't get too focused on the
0:27
cameras. The database is the underlying
0:30
problem. The cameras are only one way to
0:32
feed that database. In this video, I'm
0:35
going to say don't get too focused on
0:38
the single company that is currently
0:40
known as Flock Safety. There are many
0:43
other companies trying to do the same
0:45
thing and they will have uh the same
0:47
data and they will do things more or
0:50
less in the same ways. So, it's time for
0:52
us to talk about the real root issues
0:54
that are the problems, not just things
0:56
that are specific to flock safety in
0:58
general. And um I want to explain why.
1:01
In this video, I'm going to lay out the
1:03
main flock sales pitch. What is their
1:06
value proposition? What do they actually
1:08
provide? Then, we're going to look at
1:09
the Fourth Amendment and explain why the
1:11
service violates it. And uh then the
1:14
weird loopholes that Flock claims uh
1:17
allow them to skirt this issue and the
1:19
new legal gray areas that they have uh
1:22
honestly created because if you
1:24
understand these things, you'll be
1:25
better able to understand the issues
1:27
with some of Flock's competitors uh and
1:30
you'll be better prepared for what comes
1:33
next. Now uh a lot of the anti-flock
1:36
videos that people have been posting
1:37
are, you know, they're kind of
1:38
conjecture or guesses about how things
1:41
could be misused. uh what the downsides
1:43
of certain policies might be. And trying
1:45
to figure out how things will work or be
1:48
mishandled in the future is totally
1:49
valid. Uh but in this video, I'm not
1:52
going to do any of that. Uh I do kind of
1:54
want to do that in future videos, but
1:55
for now, this is all just real hard
1:58
facts, things that have actually
2:00
happened, things that are already in
2:02
place. And to understand the real
2:06
problem, uh we don't need to imagine
2:08
some hypothetical dystopian future. We
2:10
just need to look at the flock sales
2:12
pitch. What are they actually providing?
2:16
What are they actually selling?
2:20
[music]
2:26
Believe it or not, Flock uh is not
2:29
actually selling cameras. That's because
2:31
in the year of our Lord 2026, there are
2:34
probably 50 million commercial cameras
2:36
on uh regular businesses everywhere.
2:38
Almost half of American homes have Ring
2:40
doorbell or other doorbell cameras. Uh
2:43
almost every law enforcement officer has
2:45
a body camera on and then dash cams in
2:47
the cars and then everybody has a phone
2:50
and generally these have like lots of
2:51
cameras on them. So selling cameras
2:53
today, it's a little bit like selling
2:55
sand in the Sahara Desert. Um Flock is
2:59
also not selling access to camera
3:02
footage. Crime camera footage is uh
3:04
plentiful. The victims of crimes are
3:06
always very quick to bring footage
3:08
directly to law enforcement and file
3:10
reports and ask them for help and do a
3:12
lot of that leg work for the
3:14
departments. Uh even a lot of the crime
3:16
footage that is taken by cell phone
3:18
cameras uh gets published online. So if
3:20
cops need evidence of more crimes to
3:22
solve, it's pretty much always just up
3:25
on social media. Also, uh Flock is not
3:29
really selling automated license plate
3:31
readers. Those have been around since
3:33
the 70s and they're pretty common
3:35
technology today. So, it's not like
3:36
Flock has any real market
3:38
differentiation there. Your local DOT
3:40
guys have uh cameras that can do that on
3:43
almost every intersection. So, road
3:45
traffic is pretty well documented
3:47
already. Um, like I said in the last
3:50
video, the database of people's
3:52
movements is the real heart of the
3:54
problem and it's also the heart of the
3:57
flock business model. Now, many people
3:59
in the comment section of that video and
4:01
all the other flock videos have pointed
4:03
out that similar databases exist for uh
4:06
all your cell phone data. All the cell
4:08
phone service providers like Verizon and
4:10
AT&T have your location for every minute
4:12
that you are connected to their
4:14
networks. And then car companies have
4:16
started to collect all of your driving
4:18
data for every mile that you travel on
4:20
the road. And then cell phone makers
4:22
have all of your online activity and
4:24
location data. and even advertisers like
4:26
Meta can pull location data out of your
4:29
traffic as well. So yeah, there's
4:30
there's tons of databases that need
4:34
cleaning up. But fortunately, those
4:36
databases already have some legal
4:39
protections in place around them. uh
4:42
agencies used to be able to get these
4:44
gigantic geoenced warrants that would
4:46
demand like you know Apple or Google or
4:48
Verizon would give them all the data on
4:51
all the customers who had been in a
4:52
certain giant area and various lawsuits
4:55
and court cases have shut that down or
4:58
at least shrunk the areas. Now the
5:00
reason for this is that your phone is
5:01
usually in your home or at your work
5:04
which are private locations. The fourth
5:06
amendment says that the right of the
5:08
people to be secure in their persons,
5:10
houses, papers, and effects against
5:12
unreasonable searches and Caesars shall
5:15
not be violated. So grabbing user
5:18
information requires a warrant. And
5:21
courts have recognized this. There has
5:23
to be reasonable suspicion or probable
5:26
cause before a judge signs a warrant to
5:29
make these other companies give your
5:30
data about your activities to a law
5:33
enforcement agency. and that is uh it's
5:37
a pain. So, Flock is selling that same
5:39
information about those same activities
5:42
without the warrant. Um their argument
5:46
is that their new database of the exact
5:48
same movements and activities of the
5:50
same people is not subject to the same
5:52
privacy requirements because everybody's
5:54
movements have been documented by
5:56
cameras which are in public places. So
5:59
it can offer all that information as a
6:01
subscription service with no warrants
6:04
and no friction. The big case that they
6:07
cite here is United States versus Cairo
6:11
which said in 1984 that public tracking
6:14
is okay. If a cop could have seen your
6:16
activity from a public street corner
6:18
without a warrant, then documenting
6:20
things on that exact same street corner
6:22
with a camera doesn't require a warrant
6:24
either. And Flock's whole position is
6:27
because they have cameras on public
6:29
land, all the activity that is collected
6:32
and interpolated and extrapolated can be
6:35
served to anyone who asks without a
6:37
warrant. Also,
6:39
now the big case that is cited against
6:42
this position is probably United States
6:44
versus Jones, uh, which is from 2012.
6:47
And the Supreme Court said that
6:49
attaching a GPS device to a vehicle and
6:51
tracking it continuously over an
6:53
extended period of time does require a
6:56
warrant even if that car is on public
6:59
roads. Then a few years later in 2018 uh
7:02
Carpenter versus US Supreme Court ruled
7:04
again on tracking people this time using
7:07
uh cell site location information from
7:09
AT&T and Verizon. Uh the quote is
7:12
individuals have a reasonable
7:14
expectation of privacy in the
7:16
comprehensive record of their physical
7:18
movements.
7:20
Now, Flock argues that Jones and
7:22
Carpenter don't apply to them because
7:25
Flock uses cameras, but their product is
7:29
literally a comprehensive record of
7:31
physical movements of people tracked
7:33
continuously over a extended period of
7:35
time. And they're selling those records
7:38
to the only customers that are
7:41
constrained by the Fourth Amendment and
7:43
court cases and rulings like Carpenter
7:46
and Jones. Now, obviously, a nationwide
7:50
drag net that documents all public
7:52
travel uh violates the spirit of the
7:55
law, and I think everyone agrees with
7:57
this, but Flock's argument is that if
7:59
you put the sensors in just the right
8:01
places and you word the contracts just
8:03
right, then maybe you aren't breaking
8:05
the narrowest definition of the letter
8:08
of the law. That is kind of their their
8:10
whole argument. And a lot of other
8:12
arguments are uh they're also really
8:14
specific semantic or I would say uh
8:17
weasel words. You know, flock does not
8:19
sell a comprehensive record of the
8:21
physical movements of people. It sells
8:23
access to that comprehensive record. Uh
8:26
flock does not share your data. It
8:28
shares all the useful information that
8:30
has been mined and derived and squeezed
8:32
out of your data. Um, they're probably
8:35
going to say next, Fourth Amendment
8:37
protects us from unreasonable searches,
8:38
but the flock database can only be
8:41
queried. Um, but semantics aside, this
8:45
main sales pitch is the main problem.
8:47
They are selling a subscription to a
8:50
loophole in the Fourth Amendment. Now,
8:53
this information about private
8:54
activities, uh, regardless of how it is
8:56
collected, has historically always
8:59
required a warrant with a public paper
9:01
trail. And now Flack wants it available
9:04
instantaneously uh with no real
9:06
oversight and no real record of it
9:08
taking place. That's the problem.
9:10
Whether the surface is provided by Flock
9:12
or Axon or Motorola or some new company
9:14
that comes up with, I don't know, some
9:16
quantum sensors that track people
9:18
through ground vibrations, uh whatever
9:21
it is, the warless access of private
9:23
information and movements is the thing
9:25
to watch for. That's the thing to
9:27
oppose. The friction in gathering data
9:30
on people uh is actually a feature of
9:33
our federal government uh not a bug. The
9:36
limits are there for us to enforce, not
9:38
for us to innovate away or solve
9:42
somehow.
9:44
Now, uh, when presented with these
9:46
concerns, flock spokesman tell people
9:48
that, uh, we're just worried about
9:50
nothing because we can certainly have
9:51
safeguards and protection and privacy
9:53
and caution. But that's the opposite of
9:55
the sales pitch that they give to law
9:57
enforcement, that all access is
9:58
available, and there's no friction,
10:00
there's no delays, and there's no
10:03
warrants required. Uh, this is the first
10:06
of the two competing sets of statements
10:09
that we'll get to. It's kind of this
10:10
bait and switch. Mottton Bailey, have
10:12
your cake and eat it too kind of thing.
10:14
Uh, it's very two-faced. It's very uh
10:17
obviously unconvincing. And thanks to
10:19
attention from people like you, there is
10:22
starting to be a backlash. Earlier this
10:25
year, Flugerville, Texas, installed 28
10:27
cameras in their town, which has a
10:29
population of about uh 70,000 people,
10:32
just under. They were told that they
10:34
owned and controlled their own data and
10:37
that nobody [clears throat] could search
10:37
it without their express authorization.
10:40
The local PD in the six months that they
10:42
had the cameras up uh ran about 5,000
10:46
searches or queries on the folks in
10:50
town. However, a member of the public,
10:53
thanks to videos that you have been
10:55
commenting on, uh submitted a Freedom of
10:57
Information Act request and he got some
10:59
audit files which revealed that the town
11:01
of Flugerville had had 1.6 6 million
11:06
outside queries from 469
11:10
different law enforcement agencies
11:11
around the comp country that uh they had
11:14
not authorized. Uh you heard that right,
11:17
1.6 million queries in 6 months on just
11:22
70,000 people. Um if the entire town was
11:25
being queried, then every single citizen
11:27
was getting searched over 20 times.
11:30
Well, Flugerville is now currently
11:33
uninstalling those cameras. Uh, and then
11:36
here in Tennessee, out east, we have
11:37
Knox County. They had a contract for 140
11:40
cameras. That contract was just ended
11:43
this week by unanimous commissioner
11:45
vote. Uh, a Knox County deputy named
11:48
Jarnell originally signed up for a
11:52
$274,000
11:55
flock contract. But that's not the
11:58
important number. That's the total
11:59
number. The important number is the
12:01
little tiny orders that he placed. Each
12:04
order uh was $24,990,
12:09
which is a very important number because
12:10
it's exactly 10 bucks under uh the
12:13
amount that would have triggered a vote
12:15
from the county commissioners and alert
12:17
them to this is going on. So somehow he
12:20
was able to do this until he got up to
12:22
those 140 cameras. And when Mayor Glenn
12:25
Jacobs found out that this had been
12:27
happening behind his back, he was pretty
12:30
annoyed by this, he probably choke
12:32
slammed a whole bunch of people.
12:34
Oh no. [cheering]
12:35
Oh. Oh.
12:37
Curly.
12:39
Actually, probably he probably didn't.
12:41
But Deputy Arnell and 10 other members
12:42
of the sheriff's office have been
12:45
indicted for over $300,000 worth of
12:47
misused funds. uh none of which appear
12:51
to have anything to do with the Flock
12:53
camera system. Now, since this is a no
12:56
speculation video, I probably should not
12:58
have guessed, you know, about the choke
13:00
slamming. Um I'm also not going to guess
13:02
whether or not the contract signer had
13:04
been given any incentives to order all
13:09
of these flock cameras uh or
13:11
instructions on how to do it without
13:13
getting attention. However, it is not
13:16
speculation for me to point out that
13:18
several years ago, there was a similar
13:21
scandal in Chicago where a city
13:23
councilman had accepted uh considerable
13:26
inducements to sign a contract to
13:28
install $130 million worth of Red Flex
13:32
cameras. Um, and then when this scandal
13:34
broke, the contract was ended, but all
13:37
the cameras remained installed. Uh,
13:41
apparently Chicago was able to just
13:43
switch off all of the hardware and
13:45
switch it back on uh with a new vendor,
13:48
a new software system that wasn't Red
13:50
Flex. And reportedly, they did not miss
13:53
a single day of service while they did
13:56
this. Now, some people are wondering if
13:57
that's what's going to happen with Flock
13:59
Safety cameras or Flock Safety the
14:02
company. In fact, some people are
14:03
speculating that Flock Safety is kind of
14:05
setting themselves up on purpose to be a
14:09
scapegoat company. they will uh fall on
14:11
their own sword to appease these angry
14:13
villagers, but all their technology just
14:15
keeps running happily in the background
14:18
for a new owner to pick up. Now, I don't
14:21
actually believe that this is true. I
14:23
think Flock has taken a pretty good
14:25
beating uh over the last month or two,
14:26
but they're still an $8 billion company
14:28
in theory with a lot of momentum. Uh and
14:31
only 200 contracts have ever been
14:33
cancelled so far. So I don't really feel
14:37
like they are uh the sacrificial lamb
14:39
company uh that people think they might
14:41
be but they have definitely provided a
14:44
lot of cover to other camera companies
14:46
working on similar product lines. Now
14:49
our goal here needs to be to preserve
14:51
privacy period not just beat Flock. Our
14:54
goal is to demand permanent protections
14:56
against the kind of constitutional
14:58
violations that flock provides.
15:02
Uh a lot of people in the comments have
15:04
mentioned Axon uh as a similar company
15:07
uh kind of waiting in the wings and this
15:09
is a very good point. I was just at a
15:11
trade show this week and Axon had a
15:13
booth there. Um I don't know that you're
15:15
supposed to take pictures but I consider
15:17
their booth in a public place. So there
15:20
you go. Now, Axon offers a really
15:25
similar product to Flock amongst all
15:27
their other products and they have
15:29
really similar cameras and according to
15:32
a Flock Safety blog post from the past,
15:34
Axon was an early investor in Flock
15:36
Safety and they shared both software
15:38
technology and some collected data. Axon
15:42
owns uh evidence.com
15:45
and uh Flock API has in the past
15:48
automatically transferred data directly
15:50
into it. Now this is very normal
15:53
actually for tech companies. Uh it's
15:55
also normal for Axon many years ago. You
15:58
remember back when leftist agitators
16:00
were still asking for uh police body
16:02
cameras? Yeah. Axon and Vue or Vue View
16:07
uh were both competing for that market
16:09
share. Um they were basically neck
16:11
andneck until most departments had
16:13
already been equipped with the body cams
16:15
and then an arrangement was reached. The
16:17
Safari Land group sold View to Axon and
16:21
they consolidated everything. All the
16:24
camera hardware was tied together into
16:26
the main Axon software platform and all
16:29
the support just kind of continued from
16:32
there. This is why I say we should focus
16:34
on the sales pitch and not the specific
16:38
companies and not the specific
16:40
technologies. Any company that is
16:42
selling warrantless access to stuff that
16:45
has normally required a warrant is the
16:49
problem. Now, I didn't read the whole
16:52
fourth amendment before, so let's do
16:54
that now. The right of the people to be
16:56
secure in their persons, houses, papers,
16:58
and effects against unreasonable
17:01
searches and Caesars shall not be
17:03
violated, and no warrant shall be issued
17:05
except by probable cause supported by
17:08
oath or affirmation, and particularly
17:11
describing the place to be searched and
17:14
the person or things to be seized.
17:17
Now this amendment makes a lot more
17:20
sense if you remember that most of the
17:21
bill of rights was written right after
17:23
the war for American independence and it
17:26
is written in the context of all the
17:28
abuses that came before independence.
17:31
British authorities uh would at that
17:33
time issue rits of assistance which were
17:35
basically search warrants but they
17:38
didn't cover uh particular places to be
17:41
searched or particular people's or
17:43
persons uh to be seized. They covered
17:46
huge geographic areas and they had no
17:48
time limits on them at all. They were in
17:50
perpetuity. So British soldiers could
17:52
search anywhere and confiscate anything
17:54
on any vague suspicion and without any
17:57
judicial oversight. The fourth amendment
17:59
is a defense against that. And a couple
18:03
of months ago, the Supreme Court ruled
18:05
on another fourth amendment case uh
18:07
Chhatri versus the United States. and
18:09
they said that location data even when
18:12
shared with a third party like Google
18:15
still counts as information protected
18:17
under the fourth amendment. It still
18:20
needs a warrant. Lower courts can
18:22
obviously decide whether or not warrants
18:24
were too broad or the suspicions were
18:26
too shallow, but the warrant is still
18:29
required. Now, this is a new enough
18:32
decision that it hasn't really affected
18:33
any flock cases yet, but it will. And
18:36
the point that was made by the Supreme
18:38
Court is pretty undeniable. My travel
18:42
activity, even though it is ostensibly
18:44
public, reveals a lot of things about me
18:47
which are legally private. Uh if you
18:49
were to track my car very closely uh
18:52
closely enough, you could see where I
18:53
live obviously. You could see where I
18:54
work obviously, but you could also see
18:56
where I went to church. Uh you could see
18:59
which political events I go to. You
19:01
could see exactly when I voted in this
19:02
last election. Um, if I visit any
19:05
medical specialists, you could, uh,
19:07
guess a lot about my private health
19:08
data. [gasps] Uh, I never take my kids
19:11
to public or private schools, so you can
19:13
know that I homeschool. Uh, but you
19:15
could also watch me take my kids other
19:17
places, which reveals a lot about who
19:19
our friends are, uh, what our hobbies
19:21
are, like all kinds of things. So, even
19:24
if lock camera only grabbed license
19:26
plate data, they could still track
19:28
hugely personal and private details. And
19:31
then the AI powered search tools inside
19:34
the database would let law enforcement
19:36
do things way outside of the scope of
19:39
criminal investigations. Things like
19:41
creating a list of all the people in an
19:44
area who go to a specific church or vote
19:46
or regularly visit gun ranges or all the
19:50
people who do all three of those things.
19:53
And that uh is not a suspect list. That
19:56
is uh pre-rime demographic profiling.
20:00
And I think that's why you find little
20:02
Texas towns of 70,000 people getting 1.6
20:06
million searches performed on them in 6
20:09
months. And of course, plot cameras, uh,
20:12
they do capture more than license plate
20:15
data, lots more. I've had people send me
20:18
the results from their foyer requests,
20:20
audit logs, and stuff like that. And you
20:21
can see what the flock sales teams are
20:23
searching for when they demo the
20:26
platform uh, for prospective buyers. Uh
20:29
oh no by the way they demo the platform
20:31
using private data live private data not
20:34
not simulated but the actual data of
20:37
people that's what's being shown to
20:38
prospective law enforcement purchasers
20:41
even before the contract is signed. Uh
20:43
but in pitching the service they often
20:46
do these free form searches for things
20:48
like and I quote vehicle with a
20:50
political sticker uh a truck with a
20:54
Trump flag on it. person wearing a mask,
20:58
person holding a weapon, and so on. Now,
21:01
uh, person with weapons sounds cool, but
21:03
creating a list of people that have
21:05
weapons in open carry states, uh, that's
21:08
not crime fighting activity. That is a
21:10
pre-rime constitutional categorization
21:13
error. And these searches, which are
21:16
demonstrations by the sales team using
21:18
live data, make it obvious that there is
21:21
much much more in the database than just
21:23
license plates and vehicle movements. Uh
21:26
the sales pitch to law enforcement is
21:29
this massively powerful search
21:31
capability to go very wide and very deep
21:34
and very fast with no delays and of
21:37
course no warrants.
21:39
However, there is uh a second sales
21:43
pitch to the county commissioners and
21:46
municipal officers and the public. And
21:48
that pitch is that this database is very
21:51
small. Uh it's very limited. Using it is
21:54
very safe. It can be very slow and
21:56
cautious. Uh but these are contradictory
21:59
statement. These are contradictory
22:01
pitches. The only area where they truly
22:03
uh overlap is the statement that these
22:05
cameras provide safety. If you subscribe
22:09
to our service, you receive lower crime.
22:13
Uh, and a lot of the commissioners who
22:15
have voted for flock cameras to be
22:18
installed, they actually believe this
22:20
pitch. They're not thinking about it as
22:22
a mass surveillance tool. A friend of
22:25
mine uh in Tennessee told me about a
22:27
county commissioner in his area who
22:28
voted for flock camera installations.
22:31
And then he uh put a government
22:33
sponsored surveillance device on his own
22:35
road, which is basically a dead end uh
22:38
that only he lives on. So yeah, it's a
22:42
little self- serving, but it shows that
22:43
he genuinely believed that the flock
22:46
safety security camera would provide him
22:49
with safety and security. Um basically
22:52
just covering his own driveway. Uh and
22:55
it's extremely important that Flock is
22:57
able to sell the county commissioners
22:59
and the municipalities uh and the public
23:01
safety officers in these different areas
23:04
on this idea of lower crime as a
23:06
subscription service
23:09
because the only justification that they
23:12
have as a company for violating the
23:15
clear intent of the Fourth Amendment is
23:17
to argue that they are a private
23:20
third-party company that has nothing
23:22
whatsoever to do with law enforcement.
23:24
specifically and that the cameras are in
23:27
very specific public locations that
23:29
don't violate any privacy. But then the
23:32
sales pitch to the counties and
23:33
municipalities is that they need to put
23:36
these cameras in these very specific
23:38
spots. Uh and their only justification
23:41
for this is that the flock service is an
23:44
indispensable part of modern law
23:47
enforcement. Uh it's a very awkward kind
23:50
of loophole that they've created. it it
23:52
only exists because they've created this
23:54
complex gray area where both of these
23:57
two competing and contradictory
23:59
statements have to be true at the same
24:02
time. Now, I already talked uh in my
24:04
first video about flock cameras uh about
24:07
the importance of clear jurisdictional
24:10
limits and the separations of
24:12
institutions, why it's important that
24:14
these overlapping gray areas do not uh
24:18
ever exist. they not be allowed to exist
24:21
because of the incredible confusion and
24:23
opportunity for abuse that they
24:25
inevitably cause. So, I'm not going to
24:26
get too deeply into that topic, but
24:27
[music]
24:28
these are the two things that we need to
24:32
defend when it comes to protecting our
24:34
liberty and our privacy. The Bill of
24:36
Rights creates strong limits on what
24:38
government can and cannot do, and mass
24:41
surveillance wants to erade at least one
24:43
of the amendments in the Bill of Rights.
24:46
But then secondly, the separation of
24:48
powers creates separate jurisdictions
24:51
and flocks loopholes require dissolving
24:55
a whole bunch of those barriers uh those
24:58
very important [music] barriers. So
25:00
limitations on government and separation
25:02
of powers are the two key things that we
25:04
need to watch out for and uphold. and
25:07
companies that specifically want to
25:10
dissolve those things or bypass them or
25:13
create loopholes in them to provide a
25:16
subscription service uh to keep the
25:18
loopholes open. Those are the things
25:20
that we need to look out for whether
25:22
it's Flock or their competitors or uh
25:25
you know future companies with a similar
25:28
sales pitch. Now that being said, Flock
25:32
Safety, the company does have a number
25:34
of other uh major red flags and issues.
25:37
They are constantly moving the goalposts
25:39
on what their hardware can and cannot
25:41
do, changing their stories, changing the
25:43
rules for how records are stored or
25:46
accessed. Uh they're constantly claiming
25:48
that their devices stop crime when all
25:51
the evidence uh actually indicates
25:53
otherwise. So, I want to know from you
25:56
guys, what would you like to address in
25:59
the next video? There's no shortage of
26:01
stuff. Uh you want to talk about the
26:02
dangers of mass surveillance, uh some of
26:04
the more technical stuff, uh some of the
26:06
ways that these frictionless tools
26:08
actually make law enforcement officers
26:11
uh lazier and uh susceptible to more
26:14
mistakes. There is just no shortage of
26:16
issues to talk about. So, uh that's your
26:19
call to action for this week. Oppose,
26:21
block, fight back against the kind of
26:24
warrantless, limitless surveillance that
26:26
uh similar companies are trying to
26:27
build. And let me know in the comments
26:29
uh which aspects of this you want me to
26:32
cover next uh in this series.
26:40
[music]
26:47
[music]
26:51
Now, for those of you who like the end
26:53
credit sequences uh here at the T-Rex
26:57
Lab channel, here's another end credit
26:59
sequence, which uh shows us uh some
27:03
stuff that might be coming soon to uh
27:05
future videos on the subject. Now, I
27:08
know that there's a lot of folks that
27:09
are printing fake versions of these
27:12
cameras for bait or other purposes, but
27:15
this one is in fact completely real. Uh,
27:21
an older model, but uh yeah, just a just
27:25
a a teaser of something that we might
27:27
look at in the future.