The Milwaukee County Board voted to remove Flock cameras from its parks Thursday night. Passed unanimously, the resolution also permits the county to replace the controversial cameras with more conventional security cameras. It’s not clear  how the new cameras would be paid for.

Supv. Justin Bielinski, who authored the resolution, said he’s excited to remove Flock cameras from Milwaukee County parks. The cameras must be removed by the end of the year. 

Flock cameras are equipped with AI-powered automatic license plate reader technology. When a car passes in view, the camera takes a picture of the car and its license plate. The images are then stored in a database which can be searched at will by law enforcement agencies with their own Flock contracts. The searches can be done without a warrant, and allow officers to enter a license plate or vehicle description to determine where a vehicle has been.

Law enforcement agencies say the cameras are invaluable tools for detecting and stopping crime. Numerous law enforcement agencies in Milwaukee County use Flock including the Milwaukee Police Department and the sheriff’s office. In a presentation to a county board committee earlier this week, the sheriff’s office credited the cameras with contributing to a 43% decline in certain crimes around county parks between 2023 and 2026. 

Privacy advocates, concerned citizens and elected officials have increasingly soured on the cameras. Cases of officers using the cameras to surveil protesters, pursue women suspected of seeking out-of-state  abortions and keeping tabs on current or estranged romantic partners have made national news. In Wisconsin, three police officers and one sheriff’s deputy in Milwaukee, Menasha and Kenosha counties have faced charges of misconduct in public office due to their use of Flock to unlawfully monitor people.

Milwaukee County Executive and Democratic candidate for governor David Crowley proposed removing funding for Flock in the 2027 budget.

The sheriff’s office said that without a replacement technology, crime would increase in the 11 parks where the cameras have been installed. It’s estimated that replacing the cameras could cost as much as $140,000. In 2025, the Examiner found that at least 221 Wisconsin law enforcement agencies used Flock during that year. Several communities around the state have removed their Flock cameras since then. 

A committee of the Milwaukee County Board of Supervisors voted on Tuesday to advance a resolution to remove Flock automatic license plate reader cameras from county park property. The unanimous vote, made in the committee on parks and culture, comes as Flock cameras have grown increasingly unpopular around Wisconsin. The resolution will be taken up for a full county board vote on Oct. 1. 

Flock cameras capture images of vehicles and their license plates passing within their view on roadways. The images are stored by the AI-powered cameras, allowing police to enter specific license plates or vehicle descriptions to determine where a vehicle has been. A single search can span hundreds, or even tens of thousands of cameras across Flock’s network. 

“With great power comes great responsibility,” said Supv. Justin Bielinski in a statement. “Big tech have proven themselves time and again to be ill-suited to this responsibility. It is critical that we as elected officials ensure whatever technology is being used in our name respects civil liberties — for everyone.” 

Supv. Juan Miguel Martinez told the Wisconsin Examiner that “the entire community needs to be worried about Flock.” Martinez called Flock “surveillance” and “technology that’s not fully fleshed out yet.”

Thousands of law enforcement agencies across the country use Flock, including both the Milwaukee Police Department and the Milwaukee County Sheriff’s Office. Police leaders often tout the cameras as useful in developing leads for serious crimes such as assault, homicide, carjacking and kidnapping. In 2025, the Examiner found that at least 221 Wisconsin law enforcement agencies used Flock during that year.

Privacy advocates and concerned citizens fear Flock is a kind of perpetual and warrantless surveillance. There have also been numerous cases nationwide of officers using the cameras unlawfully to monitor current or estranged romantic partners. Wisconsin has seen four such cases in Menasha, Kenosha County, and two in the city of Milwaukee. In each of those cases officers or deputies were charged with misconduct in public office. 

The Menasha officer, Cristian Morales, was sentenced to six months in jail in August. In Milwaukee, officer Josue Ayala was given probation in lieu of jail time. The cases involving Kenosha County deputy Frank McGrath and Milwaukee detective Tehrangi Chapman are ongoing. Chapman worked in internal affairs, and was involved in investigating Ayala’s unlawful use of Flock before his own alleged misuse was reported to the department. Morales, Ayala, and McGrath were all accused of using Flock to monitor current or former girlfriends. Chapman used the cameras to monitor someone he had been watching  for years before Milwaukee adopted Flock. 

Some have also expressed concerns the cameras could be used to surveil protesters and for immigration enforcement. Reviews of Flock audit data have found immigration-related searches around the country, indicating that local and state law enforcement have conducted Flock searches on behalf of federal immigration enforcement. A deputy in Texas was also found to have used Flock to track down a woman in an abortion-related prosecution. Numerous communities across Wisconsin have canceled their Flock contracts, or worked to disable their cameras. 

Martinez also pointed to a case where Flock was used to track and intercept a man who was traveling to a neighboring state to purchase cannabis, and false alerts where people were flagged by Flock as being connected to crimes that they didn’t commit. 

In a PowerPoint presentation provided to Milwaukee board members, the sheriff’s office said that there has been a 20-25% reduction in crime in areas with the cameras. Another slide in the presentation states that there has been a 43% decrease in certain crimes from 2023 to 2026 since the cameras were installed in county parks. The PowerPoint presentation did not present evidence that the correlation was directly due to the installation of Flock cameras. 

One slide asserts that “crime WILL increase,” “deterrence costs less than investigation,” and that “slower investigations delayed justice for victims.” The PowerPoint also states that data collected by Flock cameras used by the sheriff’s office is only retained for seven days, and that a 48-hour retention limit is being considered. 

The PowerPoint claims that the sheriff’s office owns the data collected by Flock in its jurisdiction, that it is never shared or sold, that uses related to immigration enforcement or reproductive healthcare are prohibited, and that the sheriff’s office does not subscribe to statewide or national lookups. It also asserts that although Flock does create heat maps based on the vehicle data it collects, that this is not the same as tracking people. “They show density — how often data appears in an area,” the presentation states. The sheriff’s PowerPoint also asserts that automatic license plate reader technology does not violate the Fourth Amendment.

Martinez expressed doubt about how the sheriff uses Flock, and whether federal agencies can access the data. Besides the Flock removal, the committee also took up a resolution to establish requirements for reporting law enforcement staging in county parks, which also passed the committee. This would build on other efforts the county board has made to prohibit immigration enforcement from staging in the parks. 

“They nabbed like five Latino people that were hanging out down by the lagoon out of nowhere,” Martinez told the Examiner. “And that’s why I have a very personal stake in it, because we had just passed that — that they’re not allowed to stage in the parks. And then I went down there, I went down there with ordinance in hand, saying you’re not allowed to be in the park, and they were gone by that time. You know, ICE moves very quickly,” Martinez said. He said he wonders whether police surveillance including Flock could be involved in the efficiency of immigration arrests in the city. 

“I don’t have any choice but to trust them,” he told the Examiner. “Of course we’re going to be suspicious, and of course we want to push against it every step of the way.”

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Editor’s note: This story has been updated with new information from the Milwaukee Police Department. 

Although Milwaukee Mayor Cavalier Johnson has announced new safeguards for the Milwaukee Police Department’s use of Flock Safety cameras, it remains unclear whether the rules will apply to all three of the city’s license plate reader systems or only to Flock.

Flock is one of three automated license plate reader systems used by MPD. NNS previously reported that the department also uses Genetec and Axon systems. 

All three systems automatically capture license plate information that can be searched later.

As of June, MPD had access to: 35 Flock cameras, 39 Genetec cameras and Axon license plate readers installed in 80 patrol vehicles.

New limits

According to Johnson’s announcement, only MPD supervisors will be allowed to access Flock. Officers and detectives will no longer have access.

Some MPD personnel have been accused of misusing Flock. Former MPD officer Josue Ayala, was convicted in June of attempted misconduct in public office in connection with his use of Flock cameras.

Access to Milwaukee’s Flock cameras will also be limited to MPD, excluding other law enforcement agencies. 

Supervisors will be allowed to use Flock cameras only for investigating Part I crimes, which include homicide, rape and aggravated assault, among others. They can also use the cameras in cases involving critical missing persons, drug trafficking organization investigations and abductions.

The mayor also announced transparency measures. 

MPD will create a public dashboard with information about its use of Flock, and the Milwaukee Fire and Police Commission will conduct twice-annual independent audits of the department’s Flock use. 

Johnson said the commission has already begun an audit. 

The announcement does not specify what information will appear on the dashboard or what metrics the audits will examine.

NNS asked the mayor’s office whether the safeguards would extend to Genetec and Axon, whether the changes would be written into MPD policies and what the dashboard and audits would include. 

The mayor’s office referred the questions to MPD, saying that the police chief has authority over department policy.

MPD did not respond to questions from NNS.

Risks and concerns

After Johnson’s announcement, Amanda Merkwae, policy and advocacy director for the American Civil Liberties Union of Wisconsin, said in a written statement the changes are “a step in the right direction” but that “Flock is still an incredibly invasive technology that has the power to indiscriminately surveil our communities on a mass scale.” 

The use of Flock, Merkwae argued, should require a warrant based on probable cause. MPD should also face independent oversight and adopt written policies for all of the surveillance technologies it uses, she added.

“We cannot only accept a solution where police are responsible for policing themselves,” Merkwae said.

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Jonathan Aguilar is a visual journalist at Milwaukee Neighborhood News Service who is supported through a partnership between CatchLight Local and Report for America.

Milwaukee limits Flock cameras, leaving other license plate reader rules unclear is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

Milwaukee is tightening the leash around Flock automatic license plate reader cameras, with elected leaders calling for more oversight and restrictions as investigations into misuse by officers continue. 

Flock cameras utilize AI-powered technology to identify vehicles and license plates that pass within their view on roadways. The data is stored for several weeks or longer, allowing law enforcement officers from anywhere across the country to search for specific vehicles as long as their agency has a contract with Flock. 

An analysis by the Wisconsin Examiner found that at least 221 Wisconsin law enforcement agencies searched the Flock network during the first half of 2025, and that officers often used vague search terms to query the system. That same year, the multi-billion dollar Flock Safety company spent $102,000 lobbying the state government for grants to allow law enforcement agencies to acquire license plate reader cameras, though the Republican-backed bills were unsuccessful. 

On Tuesday, a directive went out from the office of Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley to county departments and the Milwaukee County Sheriff’s Office to limit Flock-related operations on county property, and to work towards adopting new transparency and accountability standards. 

“Public safety partners should have the right tools to keep Milwaukee County safe, but unchecked surveillance isn’t the answer,” said Crowley, who is running against Republican Tom Tiffany to become Wisconsin’s next governor, in a statement. “We have seen what can happen when this technology operates without clear rules, transparency and accountability. Protecting our residents’ privacy and maintaining the public’s trust is a responsibility I take seriously. That is why I am directing all County departments to limit the usage of all Flock camera systems and establish safeguards proactively, before a breach of public trust can occur.”

Crowley is calling on the Office of Corporation Counsel and the Information Management Services Division to evaluate current policies governing the use of any surveillance tech and to develop binding standards for its use. The standards will determine how surveillance technology can be used, how long data is kept, who can access that data and why, and limit when data is shared with an emphasis on prohibiting use for federal immigration enforcement without a judicial warrant, a county press release stated. These standards would also establish independent audits and enforceable consequences when surveillance technology is misused. 

Crowley is also calling on other local elected leaders to look closely at their own use of Flock cameras and adopt similar policies. Ultimately, these efforts could result in the adoption of a consistent standard across the county for Flock. 

In April Tiffany said he had never heard of Flock cameras, when he was asked about controversy around their use. “I’m going to sound ignorant on this, what are Flock cameras?” Tiffany said during a virtual question-and-answer session. 

More recently, Tiffany said that “government should not be building an AI surveillance network that tracks law-abiding Wisconsinites everywhere they drive.” Tiffany said that he would pause state funding for Flock and create a task force to establish stronger protections, penalties for misuse, limits on data sharing, and safeguards against foreign adversaries. Tiffany criticized Crowley for “repeatedly” seeking to install “more red-light cameras, speed cameras, and massive funding increases for automated license plate readers.” 

Police departments often acquire Flock cameras through non-competitive sole source contracts which bypass a public bidding process, keeping local councils and residents from even knowing that the technology has been acquired.

The changes in Milwaukee County come after the Milwaukee Police Department announced on Monday that it will be further restricting its Flock network. In a Monday press release the department said that it “supports the use of technology to assist in solving crimes that cause harm to our community,” and that new technology can help solve cases more quickly than traditional methods for investigations. 

“With that, we recognize that the use of such technology, like Flock technology, comes with great responsibility,” the department said in the press release. “These tools must always be used to prevent and reduce harm, not create more.” The department acknowledged the growing discontent and angst over Flock technology in the community, saying that “we do not dismiss these opinions.” The department went on to say that it “acknowledges the harm that former department members have caused that has damaged the trust we work so hard to build” and that it “acknowledges the human error that comes with the use of technology” and that the department is “working tirelessly to reduce error as much as we can.”

The Milwaukee police  announced that access to Flock has been restricted to supervisors only, and that the department will no longer share its Flock data with neighboring jurisdictions. Furthermore, the cameras may only be used for “Part I crimes” such as homicide, rape, robbery, aggravated assault including non-fatal shootings, burglary, larceny, motor vehicle theft, arson, human trafficking, as well as for critically missing people and investigating drug trafficking organizations. 

Earlier this year, the department began revamping its auditing procedures and limited the number of officers with access to Flock cameras to an “as needed basis,” risk manager James Lewis told the Examiner in June.

“MPD will continue to robustly audit its Flock systems,” the department’s Monday press release reads. “We are better together!”

The changes were followed on Tuesday by a statement from Mayor Cavalier Johnson that while technology can help law enforcement, “it is essential that we recognize the limitations and dangers associated with these tools.” Johnson added that “I recognize the benefits of the Flock cameras system.” He said that “on multiple occasions this tool has located critical missing persons and helped apprehend violent criminals in Milwaukee. The technology has also been misused in several notable instances, both locally and nationally, compromising the rights of individuals.” 

Several of those cases played out in Milwaukee and elsewhere in Wisconsin. Josue Ayala of Milwaukee, Cristian Morales of Menasha, and Frank McGrath of Kenosha County were all charged with either misdemeanor or felony misconduct in public office after using Flock to surveil their current or former romantic partners. Ayala was given a year of probation and avoided incarceration, whereas Morales was sentenced to six months in jail and three years of probation while avoiding prison time. McGrath’s case is still ongoing. 

In July, Tehrangi Chapman, a Milwaukee police internal affairs detective who was involved in investigating Ayala’s misuse of Flock, was also charged with using the cameras and car-mounted GPS devices to keep tabs on someone who he’d surveilled since 2019, before Flock even arrived in Milwaukee. Chapman has been charged with felonies, and his case is still ongoing. On Aug. 26, Chapman pled not guilty, and is expected back in court for a scheduling conference on Oct. 7, according to online court records. 

Each of the officers who’ve been found to have abused their access to Flock used terms like “suspicious” or “investigation” to search the Flock network, which were common terms found in the Examiner’s 2025 analysis. Other cases have also emerged, such as that of a man who is now suing the Waukesha County Sheriff’s Department after a deputy searched him in Flock following a traffic stop, for which the man sought to file a complaint against the deputy. 

As misconduct cases have emerged, communities across the state have opted to drop their Flock cameras including Kaukauna, Sturgeon Bay, Verona, Appleton, Oshkosh, Dane County and Stoughton. 

In Oshkosh, the request to cancel the Flock contract actually came from the police chief, who told local elected officials that representatives of the multi-billion dollar Flock Safety company had misled him on whether the cameras were able to develop heatmaps depicting a vehicle’s movement patterns. 

Elsewhere, community members have packed public meetings to tell local officials that they don’t want to be placed under perpetual surveillance, expressing fears about how the cameras could be misused by both local and federal law enforcement. Police leaders have had mixed responses to the concerns from residents. The police chief in Green Bay has opted to keep the cameras, citing their usefulness in solving violent crime while also acknowledging that steps need to be taken to protect people’s privacy, while a chief in the small city of Chetek threatened to do background checks on residents who spoke against the cameras in a public meeting.

Exactly how to handle the cameras is still a question local and national leaders are trying to answer. In August,  President Donald Trump said that the cameras have “pros and cons” and that “it’s being studied right now, we’ll have an answer soon as to our views on it.” When asked whether he’d consider banning Flock cameras statewide, Democratic Gov. Tony Evers said, “I don’t know what the solution is, but I think there’s people all across our country that’s talking about it.” Evers said he recently talked with Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz about Flock cameras. “Whether that [banning the cameras] is the answer, all’s I know is that we need to have an answer.”

On Monday 32-year-old Menasha police officer Cristian Morales was sentenced for misusing Flock license plate reader cameras for unlawful targeted surveillance. Morales pleaded no contest in Outagamie County court and was sentenced to six months in jail, followed by three years of probation.

His sentencing comes as Wisconsin communities push back against Flock cameras and call for more transparency and control over police surveillance technologies. 

Morales was working at the Menasha Police Department when, according to a criminal complaint, he conducted seven off duty searches using between 15,234 and 92,702 individual cameras across Flock’s nationwide network. The AI-powered cameras perpetually photograph vehicles and license plates passing within their view. The images are cataloged in a database that can be searched at will by law enforcement agencies with Flock contracts. Using the intelligence collected by Flock, law enforcement can study patterns of movement for targeted vehicles so they can be intercepted later on, or develop leads for ongoing investigations.

Morales sought a vehicle belonging to his ex-girlfriend, who reached out to the Appleton Police Department about her suspicions that she was being tracked, triggering an investigation. When officers confronted Morales, he said his actions were due to “desperation, and bad judgement, combined with a lack of sleep.” 

On Monday in court, the victim described a “pattern” of controlling and violent behavior by Morales, and said that she continues to suffer from anxiety and an inability to get through day-to-day tasks, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported. “I am here because I lived through something that changed my life,” she said in court. Morales told the court that he grew up in Menasha  wanted to serve the community since childhood. “I take responsibility for the decision I made,” Morales said, WBAY 2 reported. “In a moment of desperation, I made a mistake that I deeply regret, and I never would have imagined that my decision would bring me here where I am today, where I’ve affected so many people around me.” 

Judge Mark Schroeder called Morales an “oathbreaker.” Schroeder said Morales abused his authority. “He sought out the privilege of trying to keep his community safe and protecting the public in the communities in which he resided,” said Schroeder. “He sought out the tools that are handed to him as a result of that oath that he took and then broke. Sought out those tools with the purposes that are designed to keep people safe, and they do. And then abused it for his own personal and nefarious purposes.”

Inconsistent accountability

Schroeder’s assertion that Flock cameras keep people safe is something communities across the state and country are now debating. Morales’ situation is also far from unique, in a system where officers face inconsistent penalties for misusing the camera network. 

While Morales was initially charged with stalking, he was ultimately sentenced for felony misconduct in public office. A month after Morales was charged in Menasha, Milwaukee officer Josue Ayala was charged with misdemeanor misconduct in public office for also using Flock while on duty to track two people, including someone he had been in a romantic relationship with. The victim realized that Ayala searched her vehicle after using the haveibeenflocked website, and reported it to police. He used “investigation” as his search term to describe his use of  Flock, the most common search term according to a 2025 analysis of Wisconsin law enforcement’s use of Flock. Ayala took a plea deal last month, pleading guilty to misdemeanor attempted misconduct in public office and receiving 12 months probation while avoiding jail and prison time. 

A case involving Kenosha County Deputy Frank McGrath is still in process. McGrath used Flock and a squad car tracking system called Polaris to monitor his girlfriend, who was also a Kenosha County deputy. McGrath entered “suspicious,” another common Flock search term used by officers but, like Morales, was off duty and didn’t tie case numbers to his searches. A Kenosha sheriff’s lieutenant first noticed the unusual searches and confronted McGrath. He initially attempted to mislead the supervisor, but then admitted to doing the searches. The lieutenant also talked to McGrath’s target, who said she was aware of the searches, but didn’t report them despite feeling that the activity violated policy. McGrath had been jealous of her friendship with a male coworker. 

Although McGrath left the sheriff’s office, he was not charged with a crime. A John Doe petition to have a judge review probable cause to charge McGrath has been sealed, and the Kenosha County district attorney has said that he’s waiting for the conclusion of a criminal investigation into McGrath’s conduct. The Racine County Sheriff’s Office said in March that it is conducting the investigation. TMJ4 reported in July that at least five police officers in Racine County have been investigated for Flock misuse, none of whom had been criminally charged. 

In both Morales’ and Ayala’s cases, prior conduct had raised concerns. Morales left the Outagamie County Sheriff’s Office in 2024, according to the Badger Project. His supervisors noted that he nearly caused a car accident during a traffic stop, and had other problems. Morales was allowed to resign rather than be terminated, and was hired by the Menasha Police Department eight months later. Ayala had undergone previous internal investigations both in Milwaukee and when he worked at the Glendale Police Department. 

In early July, another Milwaukee officer was charged with misusing Flock. This time it was an internal affairs detective, Tehrangi Chapman, who was charged with felony misconduct in public office and misdemeanor misuse of a GPS device. Chapman had used Flock to monitor someone he’d been watching  since 2019, even before Milwaukee first signed its contract with Flock in 2022. Chapman had been involved in investigating Ayala’s misuse of Flock before his own misuse of the system had been discovered.

Community members fighting back

While the courts work out whether or how to hold officers accountable for abusing Flock, communities are also demanding accountability from local officials. Several areas including Kaukauna, Sturgeon Bay, Verona, Appleton, Oshkosh, and Dane County have all canceled their contracts with Flock. 

The reasons vary, from growing concerns that the cameras could be accessed by federal agencies including ICE, to the growing list of officers who have used the cameras for personal vendettas. In Verona, residents and local officials said that while they trust their local police department, they don’t trust Flock Safety — the multi-billion dollar company behind the cameras — or the federal government. Even President Donald Trump recently said that with the cameras “you have pros and cons” and that “it’s being studied right now, we’ll have an answer soon as to our views on it.”

The police chief of Oshkosh pushed to cancel the city’s contract after finding out that a company representative had misled city officials when asked whether Flock could generate heat maps depicting a vehicle’s movement patterns. As it turned out, the cameras are fully capable of doing that. Over 50 agencies statewide have canceled their Flock contracts, according to the grassroots group Deflock.

Not all police departments have chosen to give up Flock. The Milwaukee Police Department has repeatedly said that the cameras have been useful in solving violent crimes and locating missing people. The Green Bay police chief credited Flock with helping his department to become proactive in combatting a rise in violent crime. But he also acknowledged that privacy needs to be respected at all times. Auditing procedures have been stepped up in Milwaukee. Green Bay limited which  agencies can access its Flock network, and conducted its own audit of potential misuse. Meanwhile, Flock Safety has developed new tools to boost auditing and limit the ability for officers to conduct searches using vague terms and without case numbers. 

Meanwhile controversy and cancellations continue. Recently, a woman was pulled over by Brookfield officers at gunpoint because her vehicle had been mistakenly entered into the Flock system as being connected to a homicide investigation. The Milwaukee Police Department blamed personnel for not removing the car from the system rather than Flock itself, and the Brookfield police chief defended the actions of his officers.

In late July, Stoughton’s common council voted to discontinue its Flock contract amid growing concerns from residents. Among the issues citizens raised was that one of the cameras was pointed directly at the Cascade Falls apartment complex, which offers affordable housing in the area. One man told the council members that “I wouldn’t want a camera in my face all the time, so why would I want other people to live like that?” A woman named Carrie called the cameras “ominous and unwelcoming” and said, “being surveilled by your government says a lot about what your government thinks about you.” Another man questioned why a vote was needed to remove the cameras when they were installed without a vote or public input. 

Amanda Merkwae, policy and advocacy director for the American Civil Liberties Union of Wisconsin, says the lack of public input or even notice of the purchase of surveillance technologies is due to sole source no-bid contracts. These kinds of contracts bypass the public procurement process. 

“There’s no public notice, let alone clear information about if there’s even approval that happened at the common council or common council committee when they’re doing these no-bid contracts,” Merkwae told the Examiner. Companies win sole source, no-bid contracts by arguing either that only they can provide the service the police want, or that their technology is proprietary. 

“You have a police department that is maybe being advertised some product,” Merkwae said. “You have this multibillion-dollar company that’s sole goal is to increase value for their shareholders. They don’t have, like, the police department’s best interest as their driving force. They don’t have the interest of the public as their driving force. They’re trying to make money. And so, they have a huge incentive to use no-bid contracts.”

As Flock comes under more scrutiny, other companies are moving to fill the gap. Axon, which produces body cameras and other technologies for police departments, is pushing license plate readers to cities that are ditching Flock. Merkwae said Axon has other products like Fusus, a real-time crime-center platform used by the Milwaukee Police Department, that integrates private surveillance cameras, license plate readers, body cameras, and other feeds into a single interface. 

“I think that it is ludicrous to just trade one for-profit Big Brother for another for-profit Big Brother that is, like, trying to make money,” said Merkwae. “That’s their goal.” She added that local officials need to ask tough questions of both the police and surveillance companies about how the technologies work, how they can be exploited, and how citizens can be protected. She said that “a bunch of this has flown under the radar with quietly signed no-bid contracts.”

In some parts of the country, local governments have passed ordinances like Community Control Over Police Surveillance (CCOPS), which provides a framework so that the public has a say in whether communities adopt surveillance technologies. Under CCOPS, the community is given notice whenever a police department either wants to acquire a new surveillance system or renew a contract for an existing one. It provides local residents the opportunity to ask questions about how the technology works, how much it costs, and other details, while also providing an opportunity to contest its adoption. 

Even these ordinances have their limits. “CCOPS is a helpful baseline but also want to recognize that in the 10 years since CCOPS laws have been on the books, the scope and power of AI-powered warrantless dragnet surveillance tech has just expanded so much,” Merkwae said. “And the way that tech aggregates data and then integrates all these systems together, it’s like a new frontier in terms of how government entities can protect their data and protect their residents. So I think that CCOPS ordinances should be — or models like that — should be the baseline. But at this point in time, when these tools are so profoundly powerful, I think that it should be up to the local residents in a community, like, what is the line? How stringent do you want these requirements on the front end to be before allowing one of these for-profit companies to come into their jurisdiction and surveil people?”