TELL BIG GOVERNMENT TO FLOCK OFF.

100,000+

Flock Safety crossed 100,000 cameras in June 2026.

5,000+

Flock operates in more than 5,000 communities across 49 states, by its own count.

4 SQUADS

A Flock camera misread an automotive journalist's plate as stolen in June 2026, and four police vehicles boxed him and his wife into a Plymouth, Minnesota parking lot, officers with hands on weapons. The plate was never stolen: the system read 3410 DTM as 34 DTM.

$25

Columbine Valley, Colorado police accused a Denver woman of stealing a $25 package off a Flock camera hit in September 2025 and refused to show her the video. She had to produce her own truck's timestamped footage and a neighbor's doorbell camera to get the summons voided. The officer faced disciplinary action.

50+

A Washington Post investigation published August 13, 2026 found at least 50 law enforcement officers charged with or accused of misusing license plate readers to track people. Flock's system was involved in 46 of the 50 cases. In 26 of them, officers targeted their wives, girlfriends, exes, their exes' new partners, or women they wanted to meet.

82

82 Flock contracts were terminated across 28 states between August 2021 and May 2026, and 39 of those came in the first five months of 2026.

EXPIRED

The Los Angeles Police Department let its Flock Safety contract expire on July 12, 2026. Its chief information officer said the contract was not being renewed because of serious concerns around civil liberties and privacy, and around the data the cameras collect.

UNANIMOUS

Stoughton, Wisconsin voted unanimously on July 28, 2026 to terminate its Flock Safety agreement, about three months after the cameras went up. The police chief said residents started raising concerns almost as soon as they were installed.

4-0

Harrisonburg, Virginia city council voted 4-0 on July 28, 2026 to end the city's contract with Flock Safety, and the cameras were set to go dark that Friday.

2-0

Monroe County, Indiana commissioners voted 2-0 on July 24, 2026 to cancel the county's Flock Safety contract more than a year before it was set to expire, and agreed to spend $3,000 removing the six cameras.

20 BILLION

Flock told the Washington Post in August 2026 that it operates more than 120,000 cameras across more than 6,000 communities, recording roughly 20 billion license plate scans every month.

27+

The Institute for Justice's tracker documents at least 27 cases since 2018 of innocent drivers stopped, detained, or jailed after license plate reader errors. Most of the listed incidents involve Flock cameras.

2 MORE

Cambridge, Massachusetts had its 16 Flock cameras deactivated and removed in October 2025. In late November, Flock technicians installed two new cameras without the city's awareness, on a work order that should have been canceled. The city called it a material breach and terminated the contract.

BY CITY STAFF

Eugene, Oregon ordered its 57 Flock cameras shut off in October 2025. A resident checking Flock's own transparency portal found nearly 8,500 plates captured in a 30-day window after the order, and the police chief confirmed a camera had been recording. In December, city staff unbolted 55 of the 57 cameras themselves rather than wait for Flock's removal date.

7 MONTHS

Evanston, Illinois terminated its Flock contract effective September 2025. Flock reinstalled the removed cameras without authorization, so the city issued a cease-and-desist and wrapped them in black plastic. The last two cameras came down in late March 2026, roughly seven months after the termination, and only after a local newsroom asked why they were still up.

32-1

Dane County, Wisconsin's board voted 32-1 in April 2026 to eliminate the $80,000 in funding for the sheriff's Flock contract. When the contract expired at the end of May with the cameras still standing, deputies covered them with bags. Flock owns the hardware, so the county could not take the cameras down itself.

143 CAMERAS ORDERED OUT

The Knox County, Tennessee Commission voted unanimously on August 31, 2026 to pass an emergency ordinance banning fixed automated license plate readers and ordering all 143 Sheriff's Office Flock cameras removed within 30 days. Outgoing Mayor Glenn Jacobs, who had signed the original 2020 agreement, signed the ordinance himself.

138

Flock Safety's own transparency portal for the Murfreesboro, Tennessee Police Department lists 138 organizations granted access to Murfreesboro's license plate data, including the Rutherford County Sheriff's Office, Memphis Police, the Shelby County Sheriff's Office, Middle Tennessee State University Police, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation and TN ROCIC. Read from the live portal on September 12, 2026, which states it was last updated that day.

106

The Murfreesboro, Tennessee Police Department operates 106 Flock license plate readers, per a review of the city's own Flock contracts. The underlying agreements are an August 1, 2025 contract for 15 readers at $128,250 over three years and a September 19, 2025 amendment adding further readers and cameras, for a combined $646,082.70.

NO ACTION TAKEN

At the Murfreesboro City Council meeting of June 18, 2026, the license plate reader program was presented to the council as an information item recorded in the approved minutes as no action taken, while a separate two-year $243,898 contract for Flock's Raven gunshot detection system passed by roll call seven votes to nothing at the same meeting.

NONE

Tennessee's only statute governing automated license plate readers, Tennessee Code Annotated section 55-10-302, caps retention of captured plate data at 90 days and does nothing else. It contains no warrant requirement, no audit or public reporting mandate, and no restriction on sharing the data with out-of-state or federal agencies.

20 CAMERAS BAGGED

Lebanon, Ohio began covering its 20 Flock license plate reader cameras with bags on Wednesday, September 9, 2026, the morning after the City Council voted 6-1 to pause the program. The cameras were disabled and covered in place rather than uninstalled.

PAUSED, NOT TERMINATED

Lebanon, Ohio's Flock Safety contract was not cancelled on September 8, 2026. A motion to terminate the contract failed and the motion that passed only paused the program, with city staff and legal counsel given seven business days to report back on whether the city can exit without paying $60,000 for the final year of the agreement. That written report and recommendation was due to council by September 22, 2026.

54 QUESTIONS, NO ANSWER

Lebanon, Ohio Mayor Mark Messer sent Flock Safety a letter on August 17, 2026 containing 54 written questions about the city's license plate reader data, with a 21-day deadline. The questions covered how long data is retained, who can access it, whether Flock's nationwide search feature could be enabled without the police department's knowledge, whether the database could be hacked, and whether an altered image could be detected. Flock acknowledged receipt and did not answer before the deadline expired.

NONE ENACTED

Ohio has no enacted statute governing automated license plate readers. Nothing in Ohio law limits how long plate data may be retained, requires a warrant to query it, or restricts which agencies it may be shared with. Two bills are pending and neither has passed: an oversight bill introduced by Sen. Al Cutrona proposing a 10-day deletion default and a warrant requirement for inter-agency sharing, and House Bill 725, which restricts commercial sale of plate data while exempting law enforcement and has not moved since a March 24, 2026 hearing.

14 CAMERAS CANCELLED

Oxford, Ohio's city council voted 6-1 on August 18, 2026 to cancel the city's 14-camera Flock Safety contract, citing resident opposition to sharing plate data with other departments.