6 ms·

I recently contributed to https://deflock.me/ https://deflock.me/ We had a local story where the gist was the police said they searched ALPR for the welfare of

by owlninja 11mo ago

I recently contributed to https://deflock.me/ https://deflock.me/ We had a local story where the gist was the police said they searched ALPR for the welfare of a young woman, but it was actually more focused on a possible abortion. [1] "Unrelated" this same Sheriff was later charged with sexual harassment, perjury, and retaliation against a witness [2]. These are the types that are able to easily track you if they wanted to. [1] https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2025/10/flock-safety-and-texas-sheriff-claimed-license-plate-search-was-missing-person-it https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2025/10/flock-safety-and-texas... [2] https://www.fox4news.com/news/johnson-county-sheriff-arrested-lies-to-grand-jury https://www.fox4news.com/news/johnson-county-sheriff-arreste...

barbazoo 11mo ago
Checked out the map, there is one near me on a parking lot with this OSM data > camera:type fixed > direction 340 > man_made surveillance > surveillance:type ALPR Which results in "Operated by: Unknown, Made by: Unknown". What am I supposed to do with that info I wonder. How would I find out if it's actually Flock or if law enforcement would actually have access to this particular camera.
- owlninja 11mo ago
  In my case the city had to publish their agreement with Flock and I was able to find the city council presentation showing exactly where they put the cameras, and many selling points of how great Flock is. In fact, someone else in my town had already marked them. Obviously, this website does nothing for us, just glance up at any egress or ingress to where you live (in the US) and note you've been tracked. Or feel free to update the node with better information if you have it.
  - tptacek 11mo ago
    Some cities just publish these locations, and in many (most?) jurisdictions you can just FOIA the camera placements.
- aiiotnoodle 11mo ago
  This is because the metadata in OSM doesn't include the tags that Deflock looks for: You can see the requirements here https://deflock.me/report/id https://deflock.me/report/id but the two you're looking for are. manufacturer operator I think they should add Siemens Sicore cameras to their known camera database, but they do show up on Deflock despite not being mentioned explicitly on the website. Here is an example in one of my contributions via OSM. https://deflock.me/map#map=18/53.786783/-1.551438 https://deflock.me/map#map=18/53.786783/-1.551438
- criddell 11mo ago
  There are probably a lot more cameras than are listed in the database. You could point a camera down the street you live on and record the license plate of every car that passes and video of every pedestrian for a few hundred dollars. I thought about doing this a couple of years ago when there were a few instances of theft going on. To get into or out of my neighborhood, you have to drive by my home and I wondered if I could capture the license plate of the thieves.
  - tsbischof 11mo ago
    Yup, about 100k installed vs about 40k mapped
- fencepost 11mo ago
  One thing you could do is go and physically look at the camera. https://deflock.me/identify https://deflock.me/identify has pictures of cameras from at least the major providers.
nonethewiser 11mo ago
>We had a local story where the gist was the police said they searched ALPR for the welfare of a young woman, but it was actually more focused on a possible abortion. Just to be clear, most abortions in Texas are illegal. That's not necessarily a good thing. Nor are flock cameras necessarily a good thing. But given abortions are illegal in Texas, it's simply being used for its nominal purpose. So it doesnt seems like a particularly egregious use of flock. It's just as egregious as it normally is, which is pretty egregious.
- nyc_data_geek1 11mo ago
  The law can be utterly egregious and an affront to morality. Legal behavior can thus be an utterly egregious affront to human decency. See: Apartheid There is no handwaving away the moral implications of these technologies, and who they empower to do what to whom.
  - nonethewiser 11mo ago
    Im saying its a normal, predictable use of flock. Not that it's OK. Many readers might not know that abortions for the most part aren't legal in Texas. You should expect flock to assist law enforcement in catching people doing something illegal.
    - mrtesthah 11mo ago
      These specific abortion laws and systems of surveillance are new and unprecedented, as is the use of them together. So we should very much like to be aware of when they are being used.
      - nonethewiser 11mo ago
        Knowing abortions are illegal and flock cameras exist is sufficient information to know they are being used for such a purpose.
        11mo ago
tptacek 11mo ago
The thing about this Texas abortion Flock story is: whether or not your muni keeps Flock, absolutely no municipality should have out-of-state data sharing on (arguably, none of them should have any data sharing on at all --- operationally, departments do just fine making phone calls and getting the data they need). This is totally configurable inside Flock. It's very easy for a police department to do. Sometimes they'll argue that they need to keep sharing open because sharing is reciprocal --- that's not true (in fact, you don't even need to have Flock cameras to get access to Flock data; that's a SKU Flock has!). We piloted Flock with open sharing (my commission got consultation for the police General Order for ALPRs in our municipality, we pushed for no sharing alongside a bunch of other restrictions, we got most of what we wanted but not the sharing stuff). When the pilot ended and the board needed a go-no-go on deployment, another push got made on sharing and we got out-of-state sharing disabled as a condition of deployment. Then at contract renewal, when the writing was on the wall that we were killing the contract†, our police department turned off all sharing. Even if you're not worried about stuff like reproductive health care (you should be), it doesn't make sense to allow departments that don't share your General Orders direct access to your telemetry. † I wasn't a supporter on this for complicated reasons.
- buran77 11mo ago
  > arguably, none of them should Indisputably, once someone has a hammer, especially one that grants them this much extra power, they will go looking for nails. In 2025 those who still defend those "hammers" with the wide-eyed impression that they can somehow control them once they're out there are at best showing hubris, lack of foresight, and disregard for the history books. To be more clear, when you push for "less sharing" and somehow get it, you aren't actually getting what you want, you're just getting less of what you didn't want. It's like when the waiter asks you how much spit you want in your soup, the correct answer is to kick the waiter out not to demand a minimal amount.
  - tptacek 11mo ago
    This kind of reasoning is super useful if you live in a community that has a commanding majority of voters who read HN.
pugworthy 11mo ago
In exploring my state (Oregon), I'm seeing an interesting pattern to where they are frequently located. Specifically, at home improvement store parking lots. And in most cases, the ones at home improvement stores are the only ones in the city. Salem (the state capital) only has them at Lowes. Eugene is an exception with many cameras (including Home Depot and Lowe's). I'd be interested in when these cameras were placed. If recent, I'd wonder about an ICE/immigration response. Just zooming around the map, here's a handful of citys I've seen... Lowe's: Albany, Salem, McMinville, Vancouver WA, Fairview, Eugene, Bend, Redmond, Medford Home Depot: Sherwood, Hillsboro, Beaverton, Cedar Mill (Beaverton), Tigard, Vancouver WA, Portland (multiple), Gresham, Oregon City * Edit * Ah here's an article about this: https://www.404media.co/home-depot-and-lowes-share-data-from-hundreds-of-ai-cameras-with-cops/ https://www.404media.co/home-depot-and-lowes-share-data-from...
- SoftTalker 11mo ago
  Because those places have a huge problem with shoplifting. At least that's the story they tell.
  - pugworthy 11mo ago
    I imagine there's some truth to that. But if I was someone wanting to setup some ICE action, I'd probably be drooling at the thought of accessing that data being a central gathering points for day laborers looking for work. https://www.wsj.com/business/retail/home-depot-immigration-ice-deportations-8027689d https://www.wsj.com/business/retail/home-depot-immigration-i...
    - wakawaka28 11mo ago
      As I understand it, these stores are very likely to be gathering points anyway. You don't need surveillance to tell you that. Someone could walk in posing as a contractor and ask where to find cheap workers too.
      - deleted 11mo ago
        [deleted]

barbazoo 11mo ago

Checked out the map, there is one near me on a parking lot with this OSM data > camera:type fixed > direction 340 > man_made surveillance > surveillance:type ALPR Which results in "Operated by: Unknown, Made by: Unknown". What am I supposed to do with that info I wonder. How would I find out if it's actually Flock or if law enforcement would actually have access to this particular camera.

owlninja 11mo ago
In my case the city had to publish their agreement with Flock and I was able to find the city council presentation showing exactly where they put the cameras, and many selling points of how great Flock is. In fact, someone else in my town had already marked them. Obviously, this website does nothing for us, just glance up at any egress or ingress to where you live (in the US) and note you've been tracked. Or feel free to update the node with better information if you have it.
- tptacek 11mo ago
  Some cities just publish these locations, and in many (most?) jurisdictions you can just FOIA the camera placements.
aiiotnoodle 11mo ago
This is because the metadata in OSM doesn't include the tags that Deflock looks for: You can see the requirements here https://deflock.me/report/id https://deflock.me/report/id but the two you're looking for are. manufacturer operator I think they should add Siemens Sicore cameras to their known camera database, but they do show up on Deflock despite not being mentioned explicitly on the website. Here is an example in one of my contributions via OSM. https://deflock.me/map#map=18/53.786783/-1.551438 https://deflock.me/map#map=18/53.786783/-1.551438
criddell 11mo ago
There are probably a lot more cameras than are listed in the database. You could point a camera down the street you live on and record the license plate of every car that passes and video of every pedestrian for a few hundred dollars. I thought about doing this a couple of years ago when there were a few instances of theft going on. To get into or out of my neighborhood, you have to drive by my home and I wondered if I could capture the license plate of the thieves.
- tsbischof 11mo ago
  Yup, about 100k installed vs about 40k mapped
fencepost 11mo ago
One thing you could do is go and physically look at the camera. https://deflock.me/identify https://deflock.me/identify has pictures of cameras from at least the major providers.

nonethewiser 11mo ago

>We had a local story where the gist was the police said they searched ALPR for the welfare of a young woman, but it was actually more focused on a possible abortion. Just to be clear, most abortions in Texas are illegal. That's not necessarily a good thing. Nor are flock cameras necessarily a good thing. But given abortions are illegal in Texas, it's simply being used for its nominal purpose. So it doesnt seems like a particularly egregious use of flock. It's just as egregious as it normally is, which is pretty egregious.

nyc_data_geek1 11mo ago
The law can be utterly egregious and an affront to morality. Legal behavior can thus be an utterly egregious affront to human decency. See: Apartheid There is no handwaving away the moral implications of these technologies, and who they empower to do what to whom.
- nonethewiser 11mo ago
  Im saying its a normal, predictable use of flock. Not that it's OK. Many readers might not know that abortions for the most part aren't legal in Texas. You should expect flock to assist law enforcement in catching people doing something illegal.
  - mrtesthah 11mo ago
    These specific abortion laws and systems of surveillance are new and unprecedented, as is the use of them together. So we should very much like to be aware of when they are being used.
    - nonethewiser 11mo ago
      Knowing abortions are illegal and flock cameras exist is sufficient information to know they are being used for such a purpose.
      - 11mo ago

tptacek 11mo ago

The thing about this Texas abortion Flock story is: whether or not your muni keeps Flock, absolutely no municipality should have out-of-state data sharing on (arguably, none of them should have any data sharing on at all --- operationally, departments do just fine making phone calls and getting the data they need). This is totally configurable inside Flock. It's very easy for a police department to do. Sometimes they'll argue that they need to keep sharing open because sharing is reciprocal --- that's not true (in fact, you don't even need to have Flock cameras to get access to Flock data; that's a SKU Flock has!). We piloted Flock with open sharing (my commission got consultation for the police General Order for ALPRs in our municipality, we pushed for no sharing alongside a bunch of other restrictions, we got most of what we wanted but not the sharing stuff). When the pilot ended and the board needed a go-no-go on deployment, another push got made on sharing and we got out-of-state sharing disabled as a condition of deployment. Then at contract renewal, when the writing was on the wall that we were killing the contract†, our police department turned off all sharing. Even if you're not worried about stuff like reproductive health care (you should be), it doesn't make sense to allow departments that don't share your General Orders direct access to your telemetry. † I wasn't a supporter on this for complicated reasons.

buran77 11mo ago
> arguably, none of them should Indisputably, once someone has a hammer, especially one that grants them this much extra power, they will go looking for nails. In 2025 those who still defend those "hammers" with the wide-eyed impression that they can somehow control them once they're out there are at best showing hubris, lack of foresight, and disregard for the history books. To be more clear, when you push for "less sharing" and somehow get it, you aren't actually getting what you want, you're just getting less of what you didn't want. It's like when the waiter asks you how much spit you want in your soup, the correct answer is to kick the waiter out not to demand a minimal amount.
- tptacek 11mo ago
  This kind of reasoning is super useful if you live in a community that has a commanding majority of voters who read HN.

pugworthy 11mo ago

In exploring my state (Oregon), I'm seeing an interesting pattern to where they are frequently located. Specifically, at home improvement store parking lots. And in most cases, the ones at home improvement stores are the only ones in the city. Salem (the state capital) only has them at Lowes. Eugene is an exception with many cameras (including Home Depot and Lowe's). I'd be interested in when these cameras were placed. If recent, I'd wonder about an ICE/immigration response. Just zooming around the map, here's a handful of citys I've seen... Lowe's: Albany, Salem, McMinville, Vancouver WA, Fairview, Eugene, Bend, Redmond, Medford Home Depot: Sherwood, Hillsboro, Beaverton, Cedar Mill (Beaverton), Tigard, Vancouver WA, Portland (multiple), Gresham, Oregon City * Edit * Ah here's an article about this: https://www.404media.co/home-depot-and-lowes-share-data-from-hundreds-of-ai-cameras-with-cops/ https://www.404media.co/home-depot-and-lowes-share-data-from...

SoftTalker 11mo ago
Because those places have a huge problem with shoplifting. At least that's the story they tell.
- pugworthy 11mo ago
  I imagine there's some truth to that. But if I was someone wanting to setup some ICE action, I'd probably be drooling at the thought of accessing that data being a central gathering points for day laborers looking for work. https://www.wsj.com/business/retail/home-depot-immigration-ice-deportations-8027689d https://www.wsj.com/business/retail/home-depot-immigration-i...
  - wakawaka28 11mo ago
    As I understand it, these stores are very likely to be gathering points anyway. You don't need surveillance to tell you that. Someone could walk in posing as a contractor and ask where to find cheap workers too.
    - deleted 11mo ago
      [deleted]