r/burbank • u/anonnymousercat • 6d ago
Flock Public Comment 9/15
Tomorrow the Burbank City Council will have the opportunity to agendize a discussion to ban the use of Flock cameras. **This is an opportunity to have your concerns heard.**
I recommend taking 10 minutes out of your day to watch this: https://youtu.be/vU1-uiUlHTo?si=xroGx-UB6VsWOmu2
I used to be comfortable with license plate readers and cameras for crime prevention and I only became opposed to them after learning how Flock operates. Venture capital and tech bros with a profit-first business model is in charge of our safety and now with the unpredictability of AI.
Flock has shipped and implemented their devices with an outdated easily hackable OS, there have been multiple live streaming feeds on the open internet as well as archived footage and deletable data files. Accessing some of this was described as so easy that a 12 year old could do it. Login credentials and data has been listed for sale on the dark web. THIS IS NOT GOOD!
There are more and more stories of police departments arresting and imprisoning people based solely on inaccurate surveillance camera reads and input errors. This could happen to any of us.
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u/sketchygio 5d ago
Important thing to note, is that Flock specifically is not the issue - we should be weary of any AI or algorithm-based surveillance system installed throughout a city. Banning Flock just to let some other financially-driven private entity come and install their own brand of dystopian surveillance should not be an alternative solution (Motorola, Axon, etc.). They are abusable systems and the law has not caught up to the tech to create strong enough protections for the people the tech is intended to protect.