Are Your Local Police Using Flock Safety ALPRs to Scan for Immigrants?
The Electronic Frontier Foundation has found that law enforcement agencies using Flock Safety's automated license plate reader systems are running scans against federal hotlists that include targets designated by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Local police departments may be participating in immigration enforcement through this system without the public being aware.
Why this matters: Your local police department may be feeding every passing car into a federal immigration dragnet, and you probably did not vote on that. Flock Safety cameras are common — they sit in suburbs, small towns, and city streets. The point of an ALPR is to catch stolen cars or wanted suspects. Using the same network to flag people for ICE is a different thing entirely. It turns routine driving into a border-enforcement checkpoint, everywhere, all the time. Residents deserve to know if their town signed up for this, and most of them do not.
Who should care: Lawyers · Privacy officers · Compliance · Cybersecurity · General readers · Policy
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