Flock camera surveillance has eyes all over Berkeley, but at what cost?

Flock Safety is an AI surveillance company whose systems and services have been contracted by the City of Berkeley since 2023. According to the original proposal that was finally approved by Berkeley City Council on July 22, the contract’s purpose is “to deploy a critical tool to deter crime and support criminal investigations.” 

However, while advertised as a secure tool for local law enforcement, data collected from Flock cameras pose serious threats to the privacy and safety of our community.

Flock Safety systems utilize cameras and trained AI models to identify people or objects in patterns, systematically collecting vast sets of data for cities that contract with their services. Flock’s automatic license plate readers (ALPRs)—which are currently stationed at intersections across the city—consistently identify and catalogue unique vehicle information such as license plate numbers, bumper stickers, dents and scratches, and vehicle model. 

Flock recently announced that existing ALPR cameras can soon be upgraded to video-enabled status. The company also uses fixed Condor cameras to capture audio and visuals at pedestrian intersections, parks, and entrances to neighborhoods. 

In California, data sharing is limited under the Automated License Plate Recognition Act of 2015 (SB 34). This bill states that data cannot be used for immigration enforcement or any non-felony crime related purposes. However, there have been many occasions where Flock data has been subpoenaed and sought after by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and other agencies within the Trump administration.

In the Bay Area, San Francisco and Oakland police departments have been exposed for funneling information to seven federal agencies, including the FBI. In July, Oakland was found to have shared data for an active ICE investigation. In another case, SFPD illegally shared data with Texas cops who were collecting information for ICE. The search log reveals that the phrases “Assist Ice” and “ICE Fugitive,” as well as specific ICE detention numbers, were searched in the database. 

Illegal sharing of Flock data is not an isolated incident—it reflects a deeper, more troubling pattern. In Washington state, for example, a report from the University of Washington’s Center for Human Rights recently found that at least eight law enforcement agencies in the state shared their Flock networks directly with US Border Patrol. There were also instances where law enforcement conducted searches on behalf of federal immigration agencies, and at least another 10 networks were accessed via “back doors” without explicit authorization from police departments. 

Like in California, these searches were illegal. Washington has passed laws to protect immigrants, but Flock data was shared anyway. In response, at least four Seattle-area police departments have made changes to their Flock surveillance programs.

Incidents in other states also show Flock’s data collection poses a threat not only to undocumented people, but also people seeking abortions. According to a 404 Media investigation published in May, a Texas sheriff allegedly searched for a woman seeking an abortion under the guise of locating a missing person, using Flock databases to search terms such as “had abortion” and “search for female.” The sheriff’s office accessed data from 83,000 Flock cameras during the nationwide search, including cameras in Washington and Illinois where abortion is still protected under state law.

Information collected by Flock systems is stored on data servers owned by Amazon, which could leave the data even more vulnerable to federal investigations. Unlike sanctuary cities such as Berkeley, Amazon has no legal obligation to withhold data from ICE. While there’s currently no public record of a contract allowing federal agency access to data stored on their servers, Amazon did share data from private servers with law enforcement in 2022, resulting in a congressional investigation. 

But the two corporations have just recently signed a contract of their own, showing a deepening relationship between Amazon and Flock. In October, Amazon’s Ring doorbell surveillance company partnered with Flock to expand their reach of available surveillance footage, which will permit law enforcement under contract with Flock to request footage through Ring’s Neighbor app. The partnership will allow for corporate and federal collection of data right from people’s front doors, leaving more opportunities for information to be leaked to agencies like ICE.

These examples of Flock’s poor data security illustrate the ease with which federal law enforcement could target vulnerable East Bay communities using AI technology. Berkeley has entrusted the company with collecting extensive datasets that track our movements through the city in the name of safety, but this surveillance is putting the most vulnerable members of our community at risk.

Beyond concerns about data sharing, it is also notable that Flock’s claims about crime prevention are often wildly exaggerated and based on cherry-picked data. In San Marino, an affluent neighborhood in Los Angeles, Flock trumpeted that the installment of their cameras reduced crime—specifically residential burglaries—by 70 percent from 2020–2021. In reality, residential burglaries in San Marino experienced a five percent increase from 2020–2023. Rates of more serious crimes like murder and larceny were completely unchanged. Is Flock’s price tag—which runs in the hundreds of thousands of dollars—really worth those kinds of results?

This leaves us with the question: “If not Flock, then what?”

It is commonly understood that surveillance tools enable police to respond to crime, but capturing an unlawful act on camera doesn’t stop the act from happening. Flock might argue that their cameras prevent crime indirectly through deterrence, but when people are constantly watched, regardless of any alleged intent to participate in unlawful activity, it turns all members of the community into a repository of potential criminals. 

Do we really want to build our community on a foundation of suspicion and threat? It’s cliché to invoke, but constant government surveillance is the premise of a certain dystopian novel by one George Orwell. When governments overreach their authority, mass surveillance makes it dangerous for people to exercise their freedoms and constitutional rights. Crime prevention requires real community solutions, not a culture of fear. 

If the City of Berkeley is genuinely concerned with public safety, it needs to invest in community-based solutions that maximize community involvement, such as new programs that provide job training, violence interruption, and affordable housing. These approaches are more effective than throwing technology-based solutions at a social problem. Our city leaders would do well to learn from the experiences of people in East Palo Alto who, through the civic engagement of residents, were able to bring their murder rate down to almost zero. 

We at Berkeley Copwatch believe that mass surveillance of our communities is a misguided and harmful approach to public safety that erodes public trust. At a time when the Bay Area is under assault from federal agencies—and with the knowledge that Flock and city governments have failed to guarantee the security of surveillance data gathered by their cameras—we must ask ourselves if our vision of public safety extends to the most vulnerable communities among us. 

In Oakland, many residents have been organizing in opposition to the Oakland City Council’s upcoming vote to renew its Flock contract. On October 2, after three hours of public comment, Oakland’s Privacy Advisory Committee voted 4-2-1 to recommend the city reject contract renewal with the surveillance company. The decision is now up to Oakland’s city council members, who will deliver the final vote.

Berkeley City Council will also be casting votes on the extension of multiple contracts with Flock Safety. One is for fixed Condor surveillance cameras, at a cost of $310,000 for a four-year term. Another larger contract leases out 16 ALPRs—at an operating cost of $5,000 per camera per year—for an unspecified length of time. The former was first introduced during a regular council meeting on September 9, but was pushed back to an as-of-yet undetermined date due to concerns about Flock data being illegally shared with ICE and other federal agencies.

Berkeley is one of 18 sanctuary cities on the Trump administration’s shortlist for crackdowns. Our community needs to stand together to protect ourselves and our neighbors by putting an end to the city’s contract with Flock. We urge you to call your city local council member and tell them to vote “No” on the upcoming contract extension.