"A Company That Trades Privacy for Profit": ACLU on Flock's Growing Nationwide Surveillance Network

Guests - Chad Marlowsenior policy counsel at the ACLU, where he focuses on privacy, surveillance and technology issues. The tech company Flock, makers of traffic cameras that automatically record and log car license plates for law enforcement agencies, is facing increasing scrutiny over accusations that its vast, AI-sorted database has created a new, nationwide mass surveillance system. With few regulations or oversight on its use, Flock’s data can be sold to third parties or shared with federal agencies such as ICE, says the ACLU’s Chad Marlow, who works on efforts to regulate and cancel Flock’s contracts with local law enforcement. Because Flock’s indiscriminate system records information on all cars and drivers that pass its cameras, “we have a company working to record the comings and goings of every single person in the country,” in what Marlow calls “a very un-American take on privacy.” Transcript AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now! I’m Amy Goodman, with Juan González. We turn to a growing movement against Flock, an automatic license plate reader company used by over 5,000 law enforcement agencies in 49 states across the country. Critics have mapped over 100,000 Flock cameras in use on streets in rural and urban communities, and accuse Flock of building a nationwide mass surveillance system. Flock’s cameras aren’t like regular traffic cameras. Their surveillance technology records and tracks every car or human that comes into view, and then an AI algorithm catalogs the make, model, color, license plate number, bumper stickers and even scratches. This personal information is then uploaded to a nationwide database that any law enforcement agency with a Flock contract can search, with little oversight on how they use what they find. Flock is marketed as a tool to fight crimes, but the cameras collect data on millions of vehicles regardless of whether the driver is suspected of a crime. And as President Trump’s immigration enforcement crackdown has escalated, concerns are growing over whether the local data from these cameras could be aiding the deportation dragnet. Flock claims it doesn’t work with ICE and that ICE does not have direct access to Flock’s cameras or systems or data, but an investigation from 404 Media last year found more than 4,000 searches that may have been conducted on behalf of or in partnership with ICE. This past May, an audit by the Dayton, Ohio, Police Department found its cameras were searched more than 7,000 times for immigration enforcement purposes. This is what Flock CEO Garrett Langley said in a podcast just last month. GARRETT LANGLEY: And so, when the topic of immigration enforcement comes up, I’m like, “Guys, the company has no opinion on this.” If the state of Texas wants to enforce immigration, they might use Flock, but they’re going to go enforce immigration no matter what Flock does. And that’s the state of Texas’s choice. That’s the city’s choice. And it’s tough, right? It’s really tough for my employees to work at a company where they’re like, “Oh, I don’t like that law, but our technology is used to enforce it.” But we can’t make that our problem as a company. AMY GOODMAN: So, Flock is being used by universities, by big box stores. For more on it and the movement against it, we’re joined here in New York by Chad Marlow, senior policy counsel at the ACLU, where he focuses on privacy, surveillance and technology issues. He leads the ACLU’s efforts against Flock. Explain what we’re talking about here and how Flock has been used, Chad. CHAD MARLOW: So, basically, automatic license plate readers, or ALPRs, are cameras that take a picture of every single car that goes by it, not just the cars that are suspected of criminality or have done something wrong, but every single car. They record the information about the car, including where it is and when it was there. And then they put it into a database. And this is where it gets really scary, because now you have pictures of every innocent person who drives by in a database that is kept for a month or more and shared throughout the nation with all of Flock’s law enforcement customers, and in fact even internationally with people associated with Flock. And so, essentially, you know, even though in America one of our core constitutional principles is privacy, we have a company working with governments to record the comings and goings of every single person in the country, as if you and I and everyone else were potential criminals. And that is a — in my opinion, a very un-American take on privacy and the way that we engage in criminal justice enforcement. JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Chad, this company is less than 10 years old, and it spread so rapidly. Could you talk a little bit about how it was created? And also, what’s its business model? Does it set up its camera — does it rent spaces on private property to set up its cameras, or is it using public rights of way or public streets? And if so, how is that permitted? CHAD MARLOW: Yeah. So, the company was formed by an engineer, billionaire engineer, named Garrett Langley. And what is really interesting and very important about the company is that it is backed by almost a billion dollars in venture capital investment. And that is very critical, because what those venture capitalists invested in was a company that basically trades privacy for profits. And so, they will record the information about people. Flock always says it doesn’t sell data, but Flock saying it doesn’t sell data is like Ford Motor Company saying it doesn’t sell steering wheels. Yes, I understand the larger product is cars and it’s monitoring vehicles, but it’s that data that is part of Flock’s product, just like a steering wheel is part of Ford Motor Company’s car product. So, then it collects all this information, and the more information it can collect and the more it can share, the more value that the product is. And most recently, Flock was valued at almost an $8 billion company. And so, in order to increase the value of their company, they need to take more people’s data, invade their privacy more and share it more broadly. And although they may say things like, “We have certain methods in place and systems in place to prevent broader data sharing, to make sure it’s not misused,” that is all simple public relations response. Their venture capitalist investors who want to receive massive returns on their investment have forced Flock’s hand and say, “We need to put the pedal to the metal, violate privacy as much as possible, if doing that will increase our profits,” and there is a direct correlation between more monitoring, more surveillance, more data collection, more data sharing and more profits. JUAN GONZÁLEZ: But again, I wanted to ask you this issue: How how do they do this, set up so many cameras? Are they, for instance, like cellphone companies that rent their towers in buildings to be able to create their network? How do they do it? How does Flock do it? CHAD MARLOW: Yeah, right. So, what they do is they go to your local police department, and they say, “We want to rent you the cameras that you need. We will also take care of storage. We will create a back system that will take care of data sharing. We’ll do everything for you. All you need to do is sign on the dotted line.” Now, what’s interesting about Flock is, is this process of using your local police department, your local government to increase their network to spy on everyone. They have to keep pushing that in order to get as broad of a network as they possibly can. And so they sneak in these contracts. They do it with their salespeople, but they try to do it out of public view. And what we’ve actually seen in the country is, once eventually it comes into public view because their cameras are fairly easy to recognize when you see them in public, communities have risen up throughout the country and demanded those contracts be canceled. In fact, in just the last 13 months, nearly 60 municipalities have either canceled their Flock contracts or have said, “Do not renew them.” And in fact, Flock is going out in the country not only promoting its products, but trying to quash any efforts to promote transparency and public engagement before their contracts are signed, because they know the more the public knows, the greater resistance to the product will be, and they want to stop that anywhere they can. AMY GOODMAN: Talking about that resistance, I want to turn to Tobias Halpern, a 19-year-old student at California Polytechnic State University, or Cal Poly, in San Luis Obispo. Tobias Halpern started the website Deflock SLO in January to inform people about Flock’s 17 cameras on campus. Last month, the college president confirmed Cal Poly would not renew its contract with the company after the current one ends next May. Here’s Cal Poly student Tobias Halpern on Connect with Jacob Soboroff on MS NOW. TOBIAS HALPERN: When you opt into Flock, when you buy a Flock camera, like Cal Poly did, you don’t just buy a surveillance camera. You’re buying access and participation into this network. And so, I think that’s what really bothers people, and that’s what really bothers students, and that’s what bothered us at Cal Poly, is that as a Hispanic-serving institution, they are going out and entering this network that has time and time again aided ICE in illegal deportations and just created this surveillance dragnet that is really uncomfortable to anyone when you think about it. AMY GOODMAN: One of Flock’s loudest critics is Benn Jordan, a recording artist, popular YouTuber in Atlanta, Georgia, who worked with technology experts and journalists to expose Flock’s security vulnerabilities. They were able to access cameras across the country, viewing not only live streams but also 30 days of recorded content, with the option to delete the footage. Here’s a clip from his YouTube channel. BENN JORDAN: A few weeks ago, using a commercial search engine, I very easily found the administration interfaces for dozens of Flock safety cameras. I shared this information with 404 Media. And with Jon Gaines’ help, that number quickly grew to nearly 70. None of the data or video footage was encrypted. There was no username or password required. These were all completely public-facing for the world to see, and some of them still are. You don’t have to be an expert to find and gain access to this. You don’t even have to type anything in to see every single person, vehicle and activity that took place in these locations in the last 31 days. Whether you wanted to watch this footage live in real time or look at footage from a month ago, you could just point and click your way to it like you were watching Netflix. AMY GOODMAN: I mean, this is really amazing. And you have the CEO of Flock, Garrett Langley, talking about the activist group called Deflock, calling it a, quote, “terroristic organization,” but because of tremendous backlash, he was forced to apologize. Twenty seconds. CHAD MARLOW: Yeah. So, I would say, in addition to that being irresponsible, the great news is his attempt to combine Deflock and antifa failed, because whether you’re libertarian, conservative, MAGA, progressive, everybody has an objection to Flock. And so, in our disunited country, we have united around our opposition to Flock, ALPRs and government mass surveillance as a whole. And so, we’ve got a wave, and we’re going to ride it until we get our goals accomplished and end this mass government surveillance of people in the United States. AMY GOODMAN: Chad Marlow, senior policy counsel at the ACLU, where he focuses on privacy, surveillance and technology issues. He leads the ACLU’s efforts against Flock. I’m Amy Goodman, with Juan González. Thanks for joining us. Media Options