Two populous states in the United States are successively cutting off cooperation with the surveillance technology company Flock. Florida and Texas have recently taken measures to restrict the continued use of this company's license plate recognition cameras by institutions within their states, due to concerns over privacy risks, disputes over data usage, and law enforcement departments' overreaching queries.

Florida requires devices to be removed within 30 days

On Monday, the Florida Department of Transportation stated in a memorandum that it would cease using license plate recognition devices on its state highways, including the cameras provided by Flock. The document mentioned that the state government was concerned about reports of abuse of such technology, data privacy issues, and the expansion of surveillance practices, and therefore required that the removal be completed within 30 days.

A few days before this decision was announced, Florida Governor DeSantis publicly criticized this type of license plate recognition technology as being "out of control" at a press conference. The latest move by the state government indicates that such criticism has shifted from political statements to concrete action.

Texas had previously requested a cessation of funding allocations.

Before Florida, Texas last week already requested that state government agencies cease funding for Flock cameras. The reason given by Governor Abbott's office in Texas was also the misuse of the monitoring system.

One of the background events is that a police officer from Lufkin, Texas, has recently been prosecuted and faces 100 felony charges. The prosecution alleges that he accessed the Flock database without authorization for the purpose of tracking individuals. Abbott's office has not specified which state agencies would be directly affected, but local media suggests that Dallas may be significantly impacted, as there are already hundreds of Flock cameras in operation there.

The controversy over privacy and misuse continues to expand.

The controversy surrounding Flock has recently intensified, and it is no longer confined to a single state or law enforcement agency. External concerns mainly focus on several aspects: first, there is a possibility that access to the database could be misused by individual police officers; second, network security issues could increase the risk of data breaches; third, insufficient identification accuracy may lead to incorrect interceptions or even wrongful arrests.

The report also shows that the devices and systems of Flock are gradually expanding from identifying license plates to recognizing individuals and tracking people's activities. This has shifted the controversy from a traffic enforcement tool to a broader issue of public surveillance.

Frictions have arisen between communities in multiple places and the company.

Flock Currently, there are approximately 130,000 license plate recognition devices deployed in the United States. As the coverage area expands, so do the objections from local communities. Some residents believe that such devices should not be installed in residential areas or remain in the vicinity of communities for an extended period of time.

Evanston, Illinois; Cambridge, Massachusetts; and Eugene, Oregon, among other places, have previously reported that after local officials terminated contracts with Flock, the company reinstalled or reactivated the cameras. This has also drawn more attention to whether the devices will be completely removed this time after the state government's order to stop them.

As of the time of this report, Flock has not responded to media inquiries regarding whether they would allow Florida and Texas to remove the equipment, nor whether they would re-enable the relevant cameras in the future.