Inside the Growing Vigilante Movement to Knock Out Flock Surveillance Cameras
26th July 2026
The Guardian, the Mouth of Sauron in Britain.
These black cameras, which are hooked up to a rectangular solar panel and typically mounted on a pole, snap photos of passing vehicles and run the pictures against large databases. They have sparked nationwide backlash from pro-privacy critics, who point to public records suggesting that these devices can help law enforcement keep tabs on specific license plates and the people driving these cars. That they can sweep in so many people’s location from an innocent act in a public space – regardless of whether the target is a suspect in a crime, and without a warrant – has led to fears of mass surveillance.
Flock, based in Georgia and valued at $8.4bn, says its cameras scan license plates billions of times each month in about 6,000 communities in nearly every state in the US.
The company said in a February blogpost that its ALPRs are “not mass surveillance tools” and that it “cannot track vehicles, much less individual people”.