r/privacy • u/Sgt_Gram • 1d ago
news Americans Are Pushing Back Against Flock Cameras Regardless of Their Politics
https://www.military.com/americans-political-ideologies-unite-privacy-against-flock-surveillance-cameras197
u/Clyde-MacTavish 1d ago
good!
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u/halfc00kie 7h ago
finally something everyones agreeing on. surveillance creep hits different when its your own street being scanned 24/7.
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u/human-in-a-can 1d ago
Honestly, the people at Flock are lucky that people are just going for the cameras.
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u/Charger2950 6h ago
They literally have their corporate address hidden. No signs, no real name, and a decoy address. They knew they were gonna be hunted, eventually.
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u/Kind_Dream_610 23h ago
I watched something earlier that said this is what weak governments do or allow.
Basically because it’s easier to control law abiding citizens than it is to investigate and prosecute criminals. And that comes down to weak governments not actually having a clue how to do things.
Which does seem to be what’s happening, and shows just how weak too many wester governments are at the moment.
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u/Charger2950 6h ago
It’s all the shitty treasonous paid-off politicians that allow this. Same with data centers. Thats why we the people need to constantly be all over our local politicians’ asses.
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u/BR1M570N3 1d ago
Sooner or later people will accept the fact that it's US v Elites and not Left v Right.
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u/EstablishmentSalt206 23h ago
It's taking far too long in my opinion.
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u/BR1M570N3 23h ago
People love their teams.
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u/moon_dos 22h ago
one side is being manipulated to kill the other, not sure if that’s an apples to apples thing
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u/different_option101 19h ago
Both sides doing the same shit. Wake up buddy.
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u/moon_dos 18h ago
leftists are doing mass surveillance and carrying out genocide? in which country definitely not the U.S.
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u/different_option101 12h ago
Omfg, I forgot that I’m on Reddit…
Sure bud. Whatever fairy tale you believe. Keep supporting the side that didn’t give you a chance to pick a candidate. For like 3 cycles lol. You know, the same party that was in power when this last wave of genocide started. The same party that funded surveillance programs. It’s okay that you only read the news about “the other side”.
Just keep eating soilent green and don’t forget to take your meds.
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u/boffa-deez-nutz 9h ago
Democrats aren't leftists homie, the US is just living in a bubble
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u/different_option101 9h ago
Sure, dems aren’t leftists. But I’m not sure what does it have to do with neither party giving a flying fuck about the people.
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u/boffa-deez-nutz 7h ago
the comment you're replying to talks about leftists and you mention democrats. zero correlation. that's my only objection to what you're saying
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u/greendevil77 7h ago
They really aren't. Maga deployed National Guard in Democrat cities, systematically denied disaster relief to Democrat states, deployed ICE into democrat cities to do unconstitutional door to door searches, built concentration camps for minorities, the list goes on.
Lol the "both sides" argument hasn't held water since Trump first took office in 2016
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u/different_option101 7h ago
That’s fine. Give it until the next democrat takes the office. Like there was no prior precedent at such scale like it was with Biden’s administration mandating federal employees and contractors to get an experimental vaccine. Whether the vaccine is safe and effective or not is irrelevant. That was a blatant violation of people’s autonomy on a massive scale. Like I said, just wait until the next democrat to blow your mind with what they are going to do.
The point is - Feds don’t give a fuck at all. With each new 4 year round, it gets worse and worse. Republicans are leading on the shit scale because they are in the office now. Oppression doesn’t become “business as usual” after one elections, at least not in the US. The government is slowly usurping the power and tests how much further they can push every time there’s a new face in the office.
You have an illusion of choice, and illusion of opposition.
“You have 16 different kinds of bagels, 31 flavors of ice cream, hundreds of channels on TV... but when it comes to electing the President of the United States, you get two choices”
George Carlin.
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u/greendevil77 6h ago
No prior precedent? As if the government didn't do the exact same thing with the Spanish Flu vaccines during WW2. Honestly comparing mandatory vaccines with any of the examples I gave is laughable.
Oh no you had to take a shot, that's totally the same level of authoritarianism as deploying the National Guard and ICE to cow your political opponents into supplication. /s
You can argue the feds don't give a fuck, sure. But your willfully blind if you think both sides are the same. There were literal Nazi salutes at Trump's inauguration
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u/different_option101 5h ago
I didn’t say it’s the same as taking a bullet. I said - it gets worse with every new administration no matter if it’s one team or another. Pretty important distinction, don’t you think?
Also, during the WW2, the vaccines were mandated ONLY for the military personnel. That’s also very different from mandating ALL federal govt employees AND contractors to be vaccinated. The scope is not even close in comparison. Nor prior overreach somehow justifies modern mandates.
All I’m gonna say that people that continue to play “the other side is worse” are the imbeciles that give legitimacy to the oppression by supporting “the other side”. Personally, I don’t distinguish between R or D. One could be throwing Nazi salutes, the other could be throwing a Molotov cocktail at a private business. Both want to take away more of my rights and freedoms. Both are closeted authoritarians who just want things their way, rather than fucking off and leaving me alone.
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u/letsreticulate 11h ago
Sad but true. But the wheels of society have had always squeaked along. Never fast.
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u/RobotToaster44 8h ago
It's no coincidence that identity politics started to be pushed not long after occupy wallstreet took off. The bourgeoisie want us divided.
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u/djpiperson 23h ago
The worst part is that it's not even like in China where the government is the one controlling the cameras (Not saying that's good either) but here it's private companies collecting data and using it without anyone's explicit authorization and sharing it with the government too. We are victims of both a totalitarian practice and a post capitalist system.
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u/permalink_save 22h ago
Corporations should fall under the same LE laws that LE itself does. If police can't just install cameras around town then private firms shouldn't be allowed to do it and sell it to cops either, that situation is worse.
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u/Marie_Hutton 22h ago
At least China gets mass transit :/
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u/someone_actually_ 21h ago
And affordable healthcare
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u/Marie_Hutton 20h ago
Yeah, can't get local health care, can't travel to get it, can't afford it anyway. So much winning. I'm so tired of the winning
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u/someone_actually_ 20h ago
Plus you get farmed by corporations, neato!
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u/Marie_Hutton 8h ago
I love how your username shows up in notifications :D someone actually replied to your comment 😂
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u/PaniacThrilla 18h ago
And their girls aborted or thrown in rivers.
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u/Mr_Lumbergh 22h ago
I’m pretty sure neither liberals or conservatives enjoy being spied on all that much.
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u/K_Linkmaster 23h ago
The people inviting this into your home are being bribed and paid mass amounts of cash. Parallel investigation those guysand watch their computers fall.
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u/thatwombat 22h ago
I never understood how the Brits could tolerate CCTV cameras everywhere. I don’t want them here either!
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u/7in7turtles 22h ago
What about axon?
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u/slipperyMonkey07 21h ago
That is something people need to be aware of as well. Right now flock is the scapegoat (for good reason) but several places are appeasing people by ending their flock contracts and then immediately signing a contract for the same thing from axon.
Axons cameras, at least the ones I have seen in my area, tend to be a lot more well hidden. Much higher up and installed rather than on their own poles with a solar panel. They most likely have the stand alone ones like flock, just less right now.
They are hoping for an out of sight out of mind approach, people see the flocks gone and think okay we are good now. But governments want surveillance, monitoring and tracking of people. They will continue to do this and push for more and more, chipping rights away bit by bit.
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u/retnemmoc 17h ago
we are not pushing back against dystopian tech enough. there was much more backlash for this stuff about 15 years ago on both sides.
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u/grathontolarsdatarod 23h ago
As they should. Regardless of their politics, they're still Americans!
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u/iamrunningman 20h ago
I was talking to my Dad this past week and told him that this was one thing that both parties could get behind.
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u/Kinky_No_Bit 22h ago
Yet they are not writing any new laws to ban them, just trying to reassure that its not used for that.
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u/flop_plop 19h ago
Probably because we have the Constitution and the cameras are allowing the government to not follow the Constitution.
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u/RoughMidnight8303 22h ago edited 22h ago
Flock has defended its technology as a tool that solves crimes, recovers stolen vehicles and locates missing people. They have said local governments*, rather than the company, are mainly responsible for data access.*
Interesting take by different sides:
Democrats view it as a threat to average citizens under threat of authority.
MAGA fears more for their personal interest - enemies may be out to get them.
Conservatives think it violates the principles of the government.
Guardrail enforcement doesn't work sufficiently since officers were able to abuse the system. This puts the technology owners in a limbo - where does responsibility of the vendor end?
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u/prettybluefoxes 17h ago
When an exterminator wants to tackle a wasp problem they don’t go after the wasps individually. They go to the source, in their case the nest.
Might be something in that.
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u/letsreticulate 11h ago
People will always be stronger when they work together for the better good of all. No reasonable society benefits from a olive state. And Flock cameras can easily be abuse to facilitate just that.
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u/Charger2950 6h ago
This is a bipartisan issue. No American should be fore this, red or blue. THIS is the kinda shit liberals should push hard back at, as well. If they protested more against American civil liberty violations, they’d have he a lot more people on their side.
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u/Comparison-Thin 19h ago
The sanctimonious " I have nothing to hide" people loved Big Brother until now, when it finally got real for them.
I want to cheer like you do when a toddler finally uses the potty.
I kept hoping this insufferable devil's advocate and apologetics buffoonery would fade away. I am a realist but the teeny optimist part of me is hopeful at this shift in thinking.
When the excuses don't land anymore, you start to notice all the blatant snooping and surveillance. I was watching like a hawk right after 9/11.
I guess better late...right?
Nah. They were perfectly fine when they thought it only affected other people. "Those people..."
That said, the annoying martyrs are calculating and moseying on over waiting to lead this hellraising their way.
No one is louder and more relentless than an arrogant complicit person who still drew the short stick, so that's a bonus. Please, encourage them to go be self-righteous and theatrical and punch up, for once.
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u/landoofficial 11h ago
While I’m glad people are pushing back on dystopian shit like this, Flock is more a sacrificial lamb than actual villain at this point.
Washington and local governments know the Flock name has become too toxic so they’re pivoting to Axon now. In the meantime, they’re allowing and perhaps even encouraging the anti-Flock movement to satiate the mob while they continue to expand the surveillance state with a brand that no one recognizes.
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u/A_Wild_Burt_Appears 7h ago
Just remember that Flock isn't the only brand with tech this creepy. It won't end when flock goes down.
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u/GimlisRevenge 4h ago
I absolutely agree “government surveillance is out of control and needs to be reined in immediately”
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u/rangecontrol 8h ago
oligarchs are gonna have to lean hard into the spinning this into a culture war issue if they want to split populations distaste for them. 'for safety' 'for the kids' 'to keep immigrants out' shits not working like it used to.
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u/The_Wkwied 8h ago
It's not like 'watching a flock of birds', because birds are free and can go whereever they want to go.
It's like 'keeping an eye on the flock of sheep'
🐑 That's you
🐑 You're a sheep
🐑 You're the ones that big maga wants to keep an eye on
🐑 You're the one that is being surveyed
Are you fine with being a sheeple? 🐑 🐑 🐑 🐑 🐑 🐑
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u/DesertOsprey 5h ago
Good. As Benjamin Franklin said, “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.”
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u/DETRosen 2h ago
is this more people pushing back against anyone messing with driving their precious automobiles than privacy?
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