License Plate Reader Company Continues Expansion Into Private Neighborhoods With The Help Of Some Useful Cops
from the location-tracking-at-affordable-price-points! dept
But there's another force at work, one driven by private companies and aggressively marketed to private parties. But Flock, like Ring, isn't just for those who've kept up with or surpassed the Joneses. With “safety-as-a-service” packages starting at $2,500 per camera a year, the scanners are part of a growing wave of easy-to-use surveillance systems promoted for their crime-fighting powers in a country where property crime rates are at all-time lows.This may sound like a good and responsible use of surveillance tech. Flock Safety believes it can solve all kinds of problems, even though decades of policing have yet to generate appreciable progress.
Flock's founder, Garrett Langley, says law enforcement isn't capable of solving these problems on its own, pointing to FBI crime stats that show a 17 percent clearance rate for property crimes. He may be right that not enough is being done, but these systems aren't the panacea he claims they are.
This statement in particular seems insanely optimistic.
“Are we going to stop homicides? No, but we will drive the clearance rate for homicides to 100 percent so people think twice before they kill someone,” he said. “There are 17,000 cities in America. Until we have them all, we’re not done.”
Good luck.
The national clearance rate on homicides hovers around 50 percent. In some cities, it's far lower than the national average.
> More information is always helpful, but privately owned camera systems only add to the false positive/false negative problem, and private-side bulk collections being turned over to law enforcement is a pretty problematic "solution."
Tech like this also tends to nudge people towards vigilantism, something that's been observed with Ring's Neighbors app and Citizen's privately run crime reporting tool.
Then there's the marketing push that now directly involves law enforcement agencies, which tends to put cameras where cops feel they should be put, with the expected results.
When Flock installed 29 cameras in Dayton, Ohio, as part of a months-long trial for the police, residents were surprised and angry to see so many of them recording in the heart of the city’s Latino community — including outside a church where local immigrant families attend Mass and gather with friends.
It's just more of the same, but enabled by private companies that see law enforcement support as an easy way to expand their market base. Flock blamed this incident -- the surveillance of minorities frequently targeted by law enforcement -- on a "gap in communication." The company provided no details on what it told police when it gave them cameras that may have been misinterpreted by law enforcement. The cameras were ultimately removed after the targets of the surveillance complained.
Flock isn't going to give up its expansion plans. And cops really haven't found a camera system they don't like, not even body cameras which have done far more for them than they've done for the public.
Like Ring, Flock appears willing to use public servants as PR reps and installation techs.
And its expanding user base allows it to become part of a mesh network of surveillance tech that blurs the line between what the government does to us and what we choose to do to each other."
Filed Under: license plate readers, police, private neighborhoods, surveillance
Companies: flock safety
