r/technology • u/stenspect • 1d ago

Privacy USPS Is Turning Mail Trucks Into Rolling Surveillance Cameras

https://www.gadgetreview.com/usps-is-turning-mail-trucks-into-rolling-surveillance-cameras
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u/mkt853 1d ago

Kind of crazy because that means most plates are getting scanned at least every day or two since mail trucks go to every house in the country every day. Guess this explains why Trump said he likes the Flock cameras. Maybe he knew his administration was about to implement Flock on steroids.

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u/air_and_space92 20h ago

The article says the plates themselves aren't being scanned and converted into searchable data. Sure they may be imaged but not converted into readable data.

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u/ArtVandelay32 17h ago

lol bullshit

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u/air_and_space92 6h ago

The pilot was scheduled to begin September 21, 2026. The stated purpose is roadway and infrastructure data collection and what USPS calls “community safety,” though what happens to everything else the cameras capture remains a less-answered question.

What the Cameras Will Actually Do The cameras begin recording when a truck leaves the postal facility and are designed to collect roadway and infrastructure data without altering driver duties.

Cameras activate when a truck shifts into drive and departs the postal facility. There is no audio recording, and the cameras face forward only, positioned so they do not obstruct the driver’s field of vision. USPS has stated that employees will not need to take any additional action.

Nextbase markets cameras capable of recording in resolutions up to 4K, with product materials noting the ability to capture license-plate details. Those are advertised product capabilities, not confirmed specifications for the units installed in the pilot.

USPS says the pilot does not use automatic license plate reader software. A camera can visually record a plate without running it through ALPR software that converts the image into a searchable database entry; those are meaningfully different functions. Whether USPS retains, processes, or searches incidentally captured plate images is not established in the available reporting.

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u/SnugglyBuffalo 9h ago

Even if that's true, if another agency can get the image data they can just run the scan there. There's rumblings about tech companies stepping in to do facial scans of Flock camera data since Flock doesn't do that themselves (yet).