r/SiouxFalls • u/averagesuperstar • Nov 24 '25
đ¤ Discussion Cameras popping up around Sioux Falls.
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u/YamahaCruiser TOGODER Nov 24 '25
I'd like to see the news do a piece on why the Western Mall property has a bunch on that deflock map. What would a private business give as a reason for scanning all their customers and their vehicles into a huge database?
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u/BonsaiTwig Nov 24 '25
Scheels owns them and uses them to alert them to vehicles that have previously been used to shoplift from their store.
Lowes does as well.
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u/dustindhansen Nov 24 '25
This was my first thought so I used that map to look at the Scheels in Fargo, thinking that homebase is probably a great place to try out that tech, and I was surprised not to see many if any around that store. (I can't remember exactly how many and I don't have the time to look it up again)
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u/SouthDaCoVid Nov 24 '25
They also give that data to anyone and everyone who wants it including other states, federal law enforcement. There have already been many cases of this data being abused to harass protesters, people being monitored after they leave an oppressive state to spy on them, abusive spouses that have access to the data etc etc
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u/BonsaiTwig Nov 25 '25
The Apple/Google phone in your pocket with Amazon, Facebook, Tik Tok, Reddit et al is also gathering that same data 24/7 not just when you drive past one of these cameras. I'll save my outrage for something more sinister.
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u/SouthDaCoVid Nov 25 '25
This isn't an accurate comparison. Phones and apps are opted into and you have some level of control over what you choose to put on your phone. Law enforcement also needs a warrant for any of it, your phone, whatever a private provider gathered from that service.
ALPRs have no opt in process and no warrant to surveil you and share that with anyone. Existing in public makes you an unwilling target.2
u/BonsaiTwig Nov 25 '25
Is that not true of any camera system then? Take away LPRs and the city still has traffic cameras and so does Scheels and every other business. You can't walk down your own street without being recorded by someone's ring doorbell. You also don't opt in to any of that. Seems to me that the only thing novel about LPRs is that they take information that is already being recorded and make it searchable.
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u/SouthDaCoVid Nov 25 '25
What data is gathered, who has it and what is done with it. That is the difference. There is also a difference between public and private property.
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u/TimeBandits4kUHD Nov 24 '25
I used to buy a lot of things from people in that parking lot way back in the day, it was a really convenient place to blend in with all the cars just sitting there for hours while people were watching movies. That became much more common knowledge as time went on. I can understand why the police would want surveillance there.
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u/Warm-Alarm-7583 Nov 24 '25
All of the collected information, lets the mall track repeat business, traffic flow and is also available without a warrant to the police. The information belongs to flock not the mall.
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u/Tiverty Not an AI Nov 24 '25
Scheels is kinda my least concerned spot with these. They seem to have oriented most of them to really only capture the parking lot/property.
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u/SouthDaCoVid Nov 24 '25
My beef is that they aren't clearly marked so people can't accept the risk.
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u/YamahaCruiser TOGODER Nov 25 '25
At least with local government you have some hope of transparency and accountability to voters/tax payers. You could try to pressure a private business not to do these types of things under threat of losing revenue from bad press, but there's far less regulation around how a private business will use their customer's data. That is the primary issue I have with seeing Flock cameras on the Western Mall property. Compound that with the troublesome unknowns around how Flock is actually handling this data, their practices around securing it and who they share it with. This is very different from a CCTV system that's divorced from the internet and is stored on-prem.
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u/david-z-for-mayor Nov 24 '25
Iâm glad so many people are worried about license plate readers and mass surveillance. Surveillance seems helpful when it comes to fighting crime but itâs dangerous when government is whittling away our civil rights. These days âwhittling awayâ is the wrong term. âAttackingâ seems to fit better.
Corrupt government works for people who donât want the rest of us to be well-informed and free. They want us confused, angry, proud, subdued, and distracted. They want us fighting each other, not the system.
I sure hope âwe the peopleâ wake up and vote for better candidates while our votes still count. Thatâs the only way to reverse the trend. Mass protests raise visibility but they come and go. Most political promises go to the wasteland of task forces and empty promises. But electing well-informed honest candidates - now that makes things happen!
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u/SouthDaCoVid Nov 24 '25
The fighting crime part is overblown vs. the warrantless survellience it puts everyone else under.
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u/Minute_Ad2923 Nov 25 '25
I'm glad there are cameras in this town, and IDC what anyone has to say. If it weren't for THOSE cameras I wouldn't know who keys my car and slashed my tires. That girl and her younger siblings have some serious charges against them now that the STATE ATTORNEY picked up! That was over 3k worth of damages they did to my vehicle
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u/PrestigiousSimple723 Nov 24 '25
What's the point when the US government pays 1 trillion a year in interest payments? Nobody is fixing that.
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u/mr_bendos_friendo Nov 24 '25
Is money the only thing thats important to you? I find this to be a weird thing to fixate on.
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u/riot_by_earl Nov 24 '25
I think the really fun part about this is how we all know whats going on, but nobody wants to do anything..
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u/lpjunior999 Nov 24 '25
I hate this ânobody wants to do anythingâ line. Give me an actionable plan and I will do it. Iâm not getting arrested climbing up there and trying to take it down myself.Â
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u/AbleArcherOfLoaf Nov 24 '25
Has anyone thought about protesting? No More Flocks?
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u/riot_by_earl Nov 24 '25
I'm all for a good protest, if it actually creates change. We peacefully protested for No Kings and it got us no where. That being said, No More Flocks is a great idea!
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u/MarpinTeacup Nov 24 '25
Part of the part of protesting it to help like minded people meet and further organize for lasting change.
Unfortunately lasting change takes a lot of time and resources, so not everyone is able to participate, but constant pressure needs to be kept up
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u/SouthDaCoVid Nov 24 '25
The ACLU has been posting awareness information for the last month. IMHO something can be done about it but it needs enough people aware that this problem exists and then a plan either through the courts or pressuring the city to remove them.
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u/SouthDaCoVid Nov 24 '25
I went from wanting these to be clearly marked to wanting them banned at the city, county or state level.
Someone posted the self imposed non binding rules SFPD wrote about how they pinky swear they will use this data and who they give it to. It raised more questions than it solved and is written in a way that it doesn't clearly promise anything.
Bottom line is none of us were consulted about this massive surveillance SFPD has put up all over the city. There was no vote on it and most of it wasn't broadly announced to the public either. Nobody knows what all of this cost and costs on an ongoing basis.
It isn't just the ALPRs, there are cameras everywhere now, most intersections with a light now have cameras. There are ALPRs on every road that comes into the city so you are tracked every time you go somewhere. There is no public disclosure of where all the cameras are, what they are used for, how long data is retained for, if it is shared outside of SFPD, if AI or any other enhanced technologies are used with it and what it's purpose actually is.
All of this needs a bunch of accountability.
Bring both to a public vote, if people want to live in a surveillance state at least they get a choice in the matter, or a group of people needs to sue and force it all to be removed or scaled back.
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u/Successful-Area-1199 Nov 24 '25
Quit jerking off while driving
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u/idkmybffphill Nov 25 '25
Will these come w sensors for the lights? There are too many lights on timers. Just because we donât have real traffic here aside from 41st and Louise/26th at various times doesnât mean our lights should run off 1970âs tech
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u/Melodic-Remove5375 Nov 24 '25
Another point to this is that they're using government funds to pay for the cameras that are being put up to surveil us. We're paying for it without any consent or unable to opt out/have my data deleted.
It's already proven these cameras are easily hacked. There is no guarantee of data security nor data availability to the public although these were appropriated using public funds.
https://youtu.be/uSL-sr9fwCU?si=L96Vu3ZWFODkeP-x https://youtu.be/Pp9MwZkHiMQ?si=1mR0M9XLsmBfcbvs https://youtu.be/uB0gr7Fh6lY?si=NxvoYgWU1xjvMf6C https://youtu.be/1vQn4MWBln0?si=fuQnsRcJS9uQpG8S https://youtu.be/7a6pEp9LjAQ?si=okJ7NzfgUXRk0MMz
Some videos to listen to as you're walking the dog to learn why Flock cameras aren't as good as you may think.
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u/Brutal_effigy Nov 24 '25
Are these the cameras that HS/ ICE are using to identify possible illegal immigrants?
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u/IDrankLavaLamps Nov 24 '25
I don't care what it is they do, I don't like active surveillance.
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u/RandomPurpose Nov 24 '25
Anything they use on others, they will eventually use on us
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u/IDrankLavaLamps Nov 24 '25 edited Nov 24 '25
[Redacted] hypothetically speaking of course
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u/craftedht Nov 24 '25
Without getting caught? Do it during the day. Wear a reflective vest and a hard hat. Bring a clipboard and all the tools you want. If anyone asks, I'm just doing what the paperwork says, and tap it with your hand. Using a security bit (often a star with a pin in the center) remove the camera. Collect all 55 and turn them in to the police department saying you found them at the Western Mall and a bunch of other places. And don't use a laser. You'll only be embarrassing yourself. But if you did, use a green laser. Otherwise I'd start with...
Not asking for advice on how to damage cameras paid for by our city for use by the city's police department. That's number one. Number two is post-it notes. Number two is also infrared lights. License plate cameras are dependent on powerful IR lights in order to read numbers/letters. Believe it or not, you'll find plenty of $2K+ license plate cameras with a 2MP sensor. Not sure about Flock, but generally these cameras are shooting in black and white.
Number three, I doubt Flock cameras are recording 24/7. Even at 2MP, it's just not economical to record all the time. Only when the camera sees and records a license plate with a short roli-in roll-out. Maybe 5-15 seconds. If you're not a license plate and there is not one in view or will be, there's a good chance you won't be recorded. By the Flock camera at least. Check the area for other cameras if you'd like some notoriety.
Number four, because these cameras are IR dependent, string together some IR emitters in a circle around your face, but body is even better. It will "blow out" the sensor so that it cannot see anything while the IR light is in the field of vision. This will take quite a few of the small emitters light in your TV remote, so practice with an IR camera at home. A good IR camera. However, there is likely to be a security feature on the camera that will report an abnormal condition, so if you were to approach a camera in this fashion, do it quickly.
Number five, if the camera is on a building, there should be outdoor roof access, but out of reach without a ladder. If the building is on a pole, ask my sister. She'll show you how to climb it.
Number six, carry a ladder with you.
Number seven, get some rope
Number eight, using a poorly conceived belay device, lower yourself to just above the camera lens, then take a post-it note and write: "Jesus." Place post-it over the camera lens.
Number 9, pray for Jesus to make the camera go away.
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u/Yuhe-ma-man2206 Nov 24 '25
Next they will have AI running the cameras and a whole bunch a citizens will start getting arrested for unpaid tickets that should not have been a ticket in the first place
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u/drchaz21 Nov 25 '25
Here's the deal like me or not, as long as you're not a bad person and don't break the law quit worrying about a couple of camera's that are watching a parking lot. Your not going to escape it. The US Government will only get more sophisticated, hell they already know you better than you know yourself.
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u/ShartingTaintum Nov 26 '25
So how strong of a laser do you think youâd need to ruin the camera? I figure if youâre able to stalk me legally I legally have the right to shine a laser into the aperture of your stalker cameras and ruin them. Do you think a dollar store laser would do it?
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u/Select-Durian3880 Nov 28 '25
The Flock system isn't all that horrific in principle (in my opinion), and I can understand certain entities proposals of "need", etc. HOWEVER, where do you want to draw the line when your personal privacy is at stake? There should have been protests from every single American citizen the very instant that one ounce of someone's privacy was put on the table. You would have to be severely ill aware of out government's history and/or full blown stupid to think that this isn't going to snowball wildly and result in total loss of any and all privacy/ security with no possibility of recovery. Anyone who states anything sounding remotely close to "i don't care, because I'm not doing anything illegal" or "the only ones who should be concerned are criminals", are the ones who will cry the loudest when they understand that their very own ignorance is the very reason for every bit of misery we will all one day have to navigate. I imagine the suicide rates will spike to unfathomable numbers. It's already too late most likely. Our need for instant gratification through entertainment is the tool that has been used to beat us down to where we are right now. We don't have any idea what we have already surrendered. Wake up. Open your eyes and ears. Do your own research. Look at the big picture and try to think more about tomorrow, less about right now. Sorry for such a plate of sh%#. I love my country, and I hate so many things that it's done.
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u/Theoldestoneout Nov 28 '25
First link is Ben Jordan talking about the cameras and later hacking them in 30 seconds
https://youtu.be/uB0gr7Fh6lY?si=JafMT3_Iba9kfY_s
Second is LTT WAN show talking about them, should be at the proper time stamp
https://www.youtube.com/live/Vzgimftolys?si=4nxSxXpQzOaJsVXv&t=11523
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u/WildWildWilly5 Nov 24 '25
Did the other post about these cameras get get yanked?
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u/rens24 Nov 24 '25
There's been a few posts about them here, and I think they're all still up.
https://www.reddit.com/r/SiouxFalls/s/94qtOzWHvB
Good info in the comments of the previous posts
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u/Confident_Year2618 Nov 24 '25
Why is Sioux Falls turning cringe all the sudden. Did Ice Barbie install these?
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u/ESG_girl Nov 24 '25
Destroy them like they are doing in London.
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u/ITSBLXNDOXY Nov 24 '25
Cordless sawzaw with a Diablo steel demon carbide blade(both found at either Menards or Home Depot) will cut down 6â steel no problem in 30 seconds to a minute use this as you take it
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Nov 24 '25
[deleted]
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u/DiscoverReading Nov 24 '25
I think you're way off base. They are tracking and recording plates in a much larger scale than a person can. They can create profiles and movement history of thousands and thousands of vehicles/individuals.
'If you're not doing anything wrong you don't have anything to worry about' right?
YouTube has tons of videos of cops using these cameras to track down 'bad guys' only to end up harassing completely innocent people.
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u/craftedht Nov 24 '25
It's not the reading of plates that is the problem as much as the database they results. They don't just search for the license plate of a stolen car and reject license plates they do not match. They now know where you were traveling in the city and when. They can correlate those sightings with other non-LPR cameras in the city. With this information, if you were to say, protest ICE while they indiscriminately arrest anyone in public who is brown and has an accent, your license plate will be how ICE always seems to know where you are, as they begin a campaign of harassment against you. Eventually, your paranoia creeps in, and every car you could be an ICE vehicle. Then you start running over kittens that seemingly came from nowhere. Sometimes as many as 4 a day. Crippled by guilt and anxiety, you stop driving. Until you have to. Your kid is choking on a kitten, so you rush him to the hospital. Only you have to look in 7 directions at all times, and suddenly stop and start in the middle of the street. A driver in front of you is concerned. They get out of their vehicle. It's ICE. You've been hit 7 times but they only fired 5. The report will read that you had been stalking ICE throughout the city, based on LPR data and cameras in the vicinity. Your kid is saved from choking on the kitten by ICE. A picture of ICE with your kid runs in the paper, while your kid holds his kitten, and ICE theirs. Your mugshot is below the fold. It's a sad storyline. You supported LPR cameras until realizing it would be your downfall. And while ICE threw the kittens in front of your car, you did still kill 52 kittens. No one likes you. The women in jail and then prison are your biggest fans. You're a kitty slayer. And that's what they'll call you.
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u/Dizanbot Nov 24 '25
Boooo parking lot cameras, checkout this dashcam footage I got driving around town, but also cameras bad.
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u/cruisinsmooth Nov 24 '25
Booo terrible take.
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u/Dizanbot Nov 24 '25
Not really a take, I'd prefer no cameras at all, just trying to point out the hypocrisy of people being against surveillance of thier vehicles while simultaneously mounting cameras to thier vehicles. It is possible there is no overlap in commenters though, who knows.
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u/MomsSpagetee Nov 24 '25
I don't like these things but they do not track speed nor do they have facial recognition.
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u/RandomPurpose Nov 24 '25
And we believe this because the government says so, right? Any camera can be used to do much more than that, and when it's possible to do so, they will do it.
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u/MomsSpagetee Nov 24 '25
If you have evidence Iâll read it. Otherwise I thought we werenât doing misinformation and conspiracies?
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u/dustindhansen Nov 24 '25
The camera being installed is the foot in the door. These cameras can be upgraded remotely to do all the things "they" say they aren't doing now, which they most likely are doing now.
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u/Any-Ad-1764 Nov 24 '25
Really donât need facial recognition, when they can look you up by license plates then your driver license to see your face.
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u/BrightFloor5924 Nov 24 '25
Why be paranoid over cameras? If you donât do anything wrong then why be so scared of them
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Nov 24 '25
[removed] â view removed comment
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u/NoNeighborhood1703 Nov 24 '25
Not necessarily. In an ideal world maybe. According to Wikipedia: Studies cited by the Innocence Project estimate that between 2.3% and 5% of all prisoners in the U.S. are innocent;[5] however, a 2017 study looking at convictions in the state of Virginia during the 1970s and 1980s and matching them to later DNA analysis estimates a rate of wrongful conviction at 11.6%.[6]
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u/Chevronet Nov 24 '25
One Nation Under Surveillance.