No Mass Surveillance in our Community!

Dozens of cities across the nation continue canceling contracts with Flock – which use AI-powered surveillance cameras to capture the movements of every driver – over mounting evidence of misuse, abuse as well as privacy and civil liberty concerns. Pasadena will discuss whether the city should continue operating one of the region’s largest automated license plate reader networks on Tuesday November 17^th.

While Flock, some law enforcement, and government continue to defend mass surveillance for public safety, they are subjecting the general public to surveillance without consent that threatens our right to privacy and our civil liberties. This is not the kind of society we want to live in.

Reporting by NBC shows Pasadena Flock Camera data was accessed by numerous law enforcement agencies across California and out-of-state including the FBI, ICE and NCRIC. In one instance, Pasadena’s database was searched for “ICE Protest" in San Bernardino...the same day a rally was held outside a San Bernardino facility.

The Pasadena Police Department has since quietly stopped sharing with NCRIC - a fusion center in California that collects and shares “information between the federal government and state, local, tribal, and private sector partners” - after NBC reached out to Pasadena to ask why it was sharing Flock data with NCRIC.

This is a repeated pattern of lack of oversight or adequate guardrails with Pasadena PD's automated license plate readers (ALPRs). In years prior, Pasadena was notified that it was sharing ALPR information across the country, the city lacked ALPR data retention restrictions, and many residents have repeatedly expressed privacy concerns.

Flock's indiscriminate surveillance is in conflict with constitutional protections and numerous civil liberties groups such as the ACLU and the Electronic Frontier Foundation arguing that the technology infringes on Americans’ right to privacy under the Fourth Amendment. Academics, researchers and experts overwhelmingly agree that there's a lack of evidence linking Flock to crime reduction rates. An audit reveals that Flock ALPRs produce many false hits, leading to unnecessary and potentially dangerous stops from armed officers.

Join us in demanding that the City of Pasadena restore trust, uphold our constitutional rights and end ties with Flock. Instead, Pasadena should commit to funding community-based safety initiatives that don't infringe on our privacy or our civil liberties.

Demand that Pasadena City Council: Cancel the Flock contract, not replace Flock with another ALPR vendor, and commit to funding community-based public safety programs.

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