SIGforum
Flock Cameras, AI and their assault on privacy
May 09, 2026, 04:14 PM
YooperSigsFlock Cameras, AI and their assault on privacy
Flock cameras aside, some research would indicate that the average American is surveilled by cameras as often as 70 times a day and at least 10 times a day. Depending on your movements and the area in which you live or work.
If we as a society were truly concerned about privacy, we should have taken action at least 20 years ago to limit surveillance. Today, that ship has sailed and its gone so far that the harbor cameras cant see it.
End of Earth: 2 Miles
Upper Peninsula: 4 Miles
May 09, 2026, 04:22 PM
Jupiterquote:
Originally posted by HRK:
Wait until IL, NY or CA take the data from plates, and match it up to their concealed permit holders information so they can track where you drive with a gun. You know, because, safety.....
Or fine those dangerous anti-vaxxers who are putting the public at risk by daring to drive during the next Covid plandemic lockdown. I could 100% see this happening in some of the more liberal states. The possibilities are endless.
Diligentia, Vis, Celeritas
"People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf."
-- George Orwell
May 09, 2026, 04:29 PM
Jupiterquote:
Originally posted by YooperSigs:
Flock cameras aside, some research would indicate that the average American is surveilled by cameras as often as 70 times a day and at least 10 times a day. Depending on your movements and the area in which you live or work.
If we as a society were truly concerned about privacy, we should have taken action at least 20 years ago to limit surveillance. Today, that ship has sailed and it's gone so far that the harbor cameras cant see it.
Most people don't have a clue to the extent of surveillance.
Automatic Content Recognition (ACR) technology in modern smart TVs can capture and analyze up to 7,200 screenshots per hour, which equates to roughly two images every second. These images are used as "fingerprints" to identify content—including streaming, cable, and HDMI-connected devices—to build, and sell, detailed viewing profiles for targeted advertising. Where is the data going? Does anyone here not believe this is a huge security risk to have everything that comes over your TV screen sent to outside sources? People use their televisions to view VHS tapes, DVDs, security systems and much more. They are used as displays for computers. This technology wouldn't exist unless it was shared with the federal government and with their approval. I guarantee 95% of people out there have no idea this is being done. This one example is just scratching the surface.
Diligentia, Vis, Celeritas
"People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf."
-- George Orwell
May 09, 2026, 05:53 PM
vthokyquote:
Originally posted by Jupiter:
Most people don't have a clue to the extent of surveillance.
No doubt.
Politicians seem to have forgotten that they work for us, not the other way around.
— — — — — — — — — — — —
God bless America. May 09, 2026, 06:00 PM
YooperSigsI decided to count the cameras that I pass by (that I can see when I drive) when leaving my townhouse complex and drive to the grocery store. A short trip of less than 5 miles.
The count is: 20 easily visible cameras. And there is no way to guess how many I am unaware of or how many Ring cameras the residents have in operation.
The only Flock cameras near me are at Lowes.
Surveillance Nation!
End of Earth: 2 Miles
Upper Peninsula: 4 Miles
May 09, 2026, 07:04 PM
GustoferBring on the EMP!
That'll stop this shit.
________________________________________________________
It is long past time for a Convention of States. The Founding Fathers gave us this tool to fix an out of control government and we need to use it.
May 10, 2026, 08:37 AM
Fly-Sigquote:
Originally posted by Jupiter:
Most people don't have a clue to the extent of surveillance.
Automatic Content Recognition (ACR) technology in modern smart TVs can capture and analyze up to 7,200 screenshots per hour, which equates to roughly two images every second. These images are used as "fingerprints" to identify content—including streaming, cable, and HDMI-connected devices—to build, and sell, detailed viewing profiles for targeted advertising. Where is the data going?
Though I was not aware of the extent of the spying, only of the risk of the camera and mic on a tv, privacy is why my "smart" tvs are not on the internet.
We use AppleTV boxes to stream. Of course all the services track what we watch, but at least they cannot spy any further than that.
Where is all the data going? Aside from building a marketable profile of each user it is likely making its way to governments via being sold. Cellphone providers already do this.
May 10, 2026, 07:06 PM
vthokyquote:
Originally posted by Jupiter:
Most people don't have a clue to the extent of surveillance.
Automatic Content Recognition (ACR) technology in modern smart TVs can capture and analyze up to 7,200 screenshots per hour, which equates to roughly two images every second. These images are used as "fingerprints" to identify content—including streaming, cable, and HDMI-connected devices—to build, and sell, detailed viewing profiles for targeted advertising.
Coincidentally (or not!) today’s email brought the following message:
Here’s what the ACR option looks like on a Samsung TV I was able to tinker with today:
It’s under “Intelligent Mode” in the setup section. Note the text on the right: “Improves your viewing experience by recognizing your content, usage patterns, and the environment around your TV.”
Politicians seem to have forgotten that they work for us, not the other way around.
— — — — — — — — — — — —
God bless America. May 10, 2026, 08:48 PM
Jupiterquote:
Originally posted by vthoky:
It’s under “Intelligent Mode” in the setup section. Note the text on the right: “Improves your viewing experience by recognizing your content, usage patterns, and the environment around your TV.”
Good grief. There is really no telling what these televisions are doing. It one time, wasn't having bugging devices inside someone's home without their knowledge illegal? I guess they can get away with anything these days as long as it's buried deep inside an ambiguous TOS agreement. As I said before, none of this is being done without the knowledge of the federal government. Even after all these egregious examples, you'll still have ignorant people call us conspiracy theorists if we believe those Flock cameras are more than likely being used for other reasons.
Samsung's warning: Our Smart TVs record your living room chatter
"Technically Incorrect: Samsung's small print says that its Smart TV's voice recognition system will not only capture your private conversations, but also pass them onto third parties."
https://www.cnet.com/news/priv...living-room-chatter/
Diligentia, Vis, Celeritas
"People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf."
-- George Orwell
May 11, 2026, 09:57 AM
pulicordsquote:
Originally posted by RogueJSK:
quote:
The alternative point is that it invades peoples right to privacy
You have no expectation of privacy in public.
That has been repeatedly upheld in various court cases.
Tracking databases, facial recognition networks, et al have potentially problematic ripple effects.
But it's not specifically a privacy issue, since you have none in public.
The town where I patrol is having Flock plate readers installed in a couple high traffic spots. But those are plate readers only. The benefits from a LE perspective sound good, but it will be a little while before I have any firsthand experience.
And at its core, it's not really all that different from me sitting in a patrol car and typing in every plate that passes me. Just less manpower intensive.
And to my earlier privacy point, you have even less expectation of privacy with your license plate (as if less than zero is a thing), since it's not even your property... It's the state's.
FWIW: LPRs and FLOCK camera data can also be useful if you're factually innocent and have an alibi. The information is available to those accused of a crime through discovery, as Brady material. I've got no problem with these devices as an investigative tool. If they're being used commercially, I don't think there's any way someone can successfully sue these businesses since they're recording the data that's there for everyone to see in a public place.
"I'm not fluent in the language of violence, but I know enough to get around in places where it's spoken."
May 11, 2026, 10:18 AM
SW_SigFlock and other LPR systems show much more data than what is available to the public.
This is why Flock is facing several lawsuits. There are many HOA's with Flock cameras in their neighborhoods.
May 11, 2026, 11:17 AM
RogueJSKquote:
Originally posted by SW_Sig:
Flock and other LPR systems show much more data than what is available to the public.
Only if the camera data is employed by a law enforcement agency and connected to a sensitive and restricted vehicle/crime information database. (Like when I manually run someone's license plate on the computer in my patrol car, that is only accessible to LE and heavily monitored/audited/regulated.)
The Lowes loss prevention guy or a nosy HOA board aren't getting access to sensitive info via their Flock cameras. They only have access to public information (like make/model/plate/time/location/etc.), using the license plate and vehicle make/model info that is being openly displayed in public.
They could hire someone to sit at their stores/subdivisions and manually write down every car that comes and goes. They're just choosing to automate that collection and compilation.
May 11, 2026, 04:26 PM
snideraIf someone were so inclined, you can set this up for free on almost any NVR camera system.
Frigate (free, open source) can do this now.
Frigate+ is $50/yr for access to AI models to improve process timing.
You could run you own AI locally & do the same thing (at the cost of needing more hardware & setup time).
I set up a $30 wifi camera that could identify my dog (or wife) and alert me if she (the dog) was on the couch. That was 10+ years ago & took very little time to set up with 1 camera. Back then, without AI, it couldn't really tell the difference between 2 people*, but it could tell the difference between an empty couch, a person & a dog. I didn't test license plates, but I think that was a feature then. It is now for sure.
*It would detect me or my wife as a person. I'm a foot taller & almost 150lb heavier.
I still have the camera, I'd see if LPR is easy if we had front plates in IN. Useless for triggering automation since I don't back into the driveway.
May 14, 2026, 09:49 AM
nhracecraftquote:
“I want to be clear what these cameras actually are, and I say that with somebody with 20 years of experience in IT. I've served as the chief network architect for Fortune 500 companies, I've designed data centers, and today I work on cloud infrastructure for one of the largest loan origination companies in the country. I'm not speculating on how this technology works. I've read their patents and I know how it works.
Flock advertises these cameras as simple license plate readers. But their own patents tell a different story.
They're AI-powered surveillance machines that capture every passing vehicle and person and transmit that data to a private corporate cloud, making it queryable by a multitude of state and federal agencies. The city of Corona does not control that database, and Corona residents have no public record rights against a private company's servers. Our daily movements are being harvested by a $7.5 billion corporation, that only answers to venture capital investors, not to us. Flock did not reach that valuation on their per-camera subscription fees. That math doesn't add up
The city council should also understand who they're doing business with. Flock CEO was asked whether the company had any federal contracts. He said no. That was a lie.
Public records revealed that Flock had been secretly running a pilot program giving the US Border Patrol access to local police camera data without the knowledge of the cities that paid for the cameras.
Now consider who's behind the company and where your data flows. Flock integrates directly with Palantir, a data fusion platform, with a $30 million contract with ICE. Peter Thiel, the founder of Palantir, is also one of Flock's primary investors. These are not separate companies with separate agendas. They are connected actors that are building a connected infrastructure.
Palantir's own CEO stated publicly just this month that his technology is being used as a political instrument, designed to reduce the political power of certain voters. And that's the ecosystem that our Corona cameras are feeding into.
We're not anti-police at all. We're against mass surveillance of innocent residents by a company with a documented record of deception, built by investors with a stated political agenda. We're asking the City Council to start auditing the queries made against Flock's database, to disclose any data sharing agreements, and to take a vote to cancel the Flock safety contract”
I looked more into this and he is 100% right
Patents describe broader object detection, including tracking people and pedestrians, patents like US11416545B1. The system uses a centralized cloud database for nationwide queries
Data goes to Flock’s private cloud, AWS-based, encrypted. Nationwide lookup is common, 75%+ of customers are enrolled enabling cross-jurisdictional searches. Residents have no direct public records access to the corporate servers.
This creates a mass surveillance network feeding a private company’s infrastructure
If you ask me this is laying the infrastructure for a mass surveillance network in America. We are being lied to. Cancel all contracts nationwide!
____________________________________________________________
If Some is Good, and More is Better.....then Too Much, is Just Enough !!
Trump 47....Making America Great Again!
"May Almighty God bless the United States of America" - parabellum 7/26/20
Live Free or Die!
May 14, 2026, 10:12 AM
HRKcan anyone think of a place with cameras everywhere that feed data to governments, and issue tickets for parking, speeding, immediately, then report peoples movements using AI and facial recognition to get patterns on who does what, where and when, class? Class? CLASSSSS! Thank you...
https://x.com/OnTop1046759976/.../2054737642768535584May 14, 2026, 11:20 AM
mrvmaxKiss goodbye to privacy, our technology driven society is the cause of it. How many “data breaches” have you been part of? That info was not supposed to be public, it was just for so and so company to use it.
Yes, we are being tracked by our cell phones, tablets, watches, tv’s, AI assistants, apps etc. Every store we go to have cameras and cities install these flock cameras to stop crime. Heck, most stores I go to act like I’m an alien when I try to pay with cash and I won’t swipe their computer based payment system (that tracks me too).
It is all for our good and it would never be used against us. Well, until it needs to be. We have no expectation of privacy so get used to it. If you have figured a way around it then let me know.
May 14, 2026, 01:32 PM
vthokyCash is king. (For as long as we're allowed to use it.)
And yes, we are being lied to.
Politicians seem to have forgotten that they work for us, not the other way around.
— — — — — — — — — — — —
God bless America. May 14, 2026, 01:45 PM
selogicI'm at the point in my life where I just don't care. If The Man wants to track me while I drive to the grocery store or take the wife to physical therapy , they can have at it. Go ahead and analyze my TV viewing. I'm not sure what you'll learn from it. I know I should care , but I don't .
May 14, 2026, 01:52 PM
Chowserwe had a fatal hit and run of a pedestrian the other night. wishing we had more flock cameras in our area. all i got is pickup truck from local business cameras so flock isn't getting much in my area, gotta expand the search parameters.
and if you don't believe your smart phone is not spying on you, you're naive.
personally, i don't care who's tracking me, i'm not doing anything illegal and i'm no one important for anyone to spy on.
Not minority enough! May 14, 2026, 01:56 PM
HRKWhy should we care, because Tech won't stop in creating new and inventive ways to get government grants in the millions or billions to pay for surveillance systems.
Is this what we want to leave for our kids and grandkids?
https://x.com/BrianRoemmele/st.../2054726431918420393