The candidates running to be Iowa’s next governor use words like “creepy” and “invasive” to describe the tens of thousands of Flock cameras that are capturing and storing license plate images and both would support state regulations for automated license plate readers.
Republican candidate Zach Lahn uses the word “suspicious” to describe the dramatic growth of Flock’s national network of cameras. “This is a private company that is owning your data of where you drive anywhere, anytime you’re in Des Moines or some of these other cities. They’re popping up everywhere,” Lahn said. “This is what a surveillance state starts out as.”
Law enforcement agencies say the cameras are valuable in tracking vehicles that may be tied to crimes because the license plate readers provide real time information about a vehicle’s location and where it’s headed. “I understand some of these things can help recover cars or, you know, even help on the child trafficking. I get that,” Lahn said, “but we always have to make sure we’re first saying: ‘How are we protecting our constitutional rights?'”
Lahn points to some of the lawsuits that have been filed against Flock, including one that accuses the company of violating a California law by sharing its data with out-of-state and federal law enforcement. “This is your data on your license plates and everywhere you drive,” Lahn said. “…Many times that information is being accessed by people who should never have access to it.”
Rob Sand, the Democrat running for governor, said companies with better data protection measures are now competing with Flock. “I think that people who have privacy concerns (about Flock) are being reasonable,” Sand said. “I think what we’ve seen is a company that built this stuff out and did not put checks and balances into place to make sure that what they were doing wasn’t going to get abused…That doesn’t mean that we need drastic, immediate action. We are seeing the market work right now. They’re losing contracts.”
Iowa cities like Oelwein, Coralville and Indianola have ended agreements with Flock over privacy concerns. Critics say Flock’s data can be used to track the movements of millions of Americans, without a warrant. A Kentucky policeman, for example, has been charged for using 2000 Flock searches to track his ex-girlfriend. “I think a lot of people who read these stories about what’s going on find it creepy,” Sand said, “for good reason.”
Sand said with Flock now facing competitors with better security measures, it appears the market is working, but if concerns remain down the road, Sand saod he’d be “happy to sign” a law that establishes some safeguards for the collection, storage and sharing of data from cameras that read license plates. “At the time being I think that’s a reasonable way when we have a lot of issues that we know we need to address with state action,” Sand said.
This spring, the Iowa House and Senate considered legislation that would have established state regulations for automated license plate readers, but it did not become law. Last month, Flock’s CEO announced the company was adopting a series of security measures, reducing how long the company retains license plate data from 30 days down to 7. It no longer allows law enforcement officers to freely search the database. Police must enter a criminal case number or code for every search.
Flock’s major competitors are Motorola, the company that built the first cell phone and Axon, a company that began making body-worn cameras 18 years ago.