538
Flock Said Its Cameras Don't Track People. Then a Reporter Proved Them Wrong On Video
(www.gadgetreview.com)
this post was submitted on 18 Jul 2026
538 points (99.3% liked)
Technology
86469 readers
3223 users here now
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
Our Rules
- Follow the lemmy.world rules.
- Only tech related news or articles.
- Be excellent to each other!
- Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
- Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
- Politics threads may be removed.
- No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
- Only approved bots from the list below, this includes using AI responses and summaries. To ask if your bot can be added please contact a mod.
- Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
- Accounts 7 days and younger will have their posts automatically removed.
Approved Bots
founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
That didn't address my point.
Is public video recording considered a 4th amendment violation?
Because that's what the Flock cameras do.
The rest of what makes Flock... is processing after the fact. And that analysis is effectively the same as what any social media or advertising company does when they build a profile on you. Actually basically any tech company nowadays is making a profile for you and attaching it to whatever data they can get their hands on, and usually selling access to their data on you as well. And those are clearly considered legal. Whether they should be is a different topic.
The data processing isn't after the fact, its happening in real time and your examples of tech companies tracking you are things you can opt out of but you can't opt out of being tracked by these cameras posted around your city on government property funded by your own tax dollars.
Police arent allowed to perform a stakeout on a citizen and track all their movements 24/7 without a warrant, therefore they shouldn't be allowed to have some AI do it without a warrant instead.
I thought I was pretty clear in my original comment. Can the government hire a company to violate your rights? Even if filming in public is legal otherwise, maybe it should be illegal when hired by the government to do warrantless surveillance of every citizen.
Your question is what is not decided yet. The merger of surveillance capitalism and the federal government is something warned about decades ago and now it's here. It takes years for this stuff to make it's way through courts and up to SCOTUS (assuming it will get there).
Your point makes sense because a ruling against flock could also impact the tech companies that have been doing invasive tracking, arguably even more invasive, for decades. What makes flock different though are the direct contracts with governments.
There is a recent case that may support all this being illegal. SCOTUS recently ruled governments using geofencing data does constituent a search and therefore 4th amendment protections.
Are you arguing that this is fine, or acceptable?
I don't think anyone here is arguing. This is just what a complex conversation looks like.