Vandals target Flock cameras. Police use Flock to catch them
Between April 1 and Oct. 12 last year, a man in Suffolk, Virginia, allegedly destroyed 13 AI-powered license plate reader cameras built by the surveillance company Flock Safety.
Jeffrey Scott Sovern, 41, who was arrested and later released on Oct. 17, doesn’t admit to vandalizing the surveillance cameras that have stirred controversy around the country. But he told Straight Arrow News he believes license plate reader systems are unconstitutional — and that Flock Safety is responsible for ushering in “an unhealthy surveillance state.”
Sovern, an engineer, is charged with 13 counts of felony destruction of property, six counts of possessing burglary tools and six counts of petit larceny. Investigators say a search warrant executed at Sovern’s residence uncovered components that included six solar panels used by Flock’s cameras. He has pleaded not guilty.
The details surrounding Sovern’s case aren’t unique. An analysis by SAN of audit logs released by police departments in response to public records requests shows that law enforcement has repeatedly used data obtained by Flock cameras to investigate vandalism against Flock cameras.
The audit logs, hosted by the website HaveIBeenFlocked.com, show queries made by numerous Flock customers in the public sector. Using Flock’s software, law enforcement can search not only for license plates scanned by cameras under their control and in their jurisdiction, but also for those captured by other Flock customers across the country.
On Feb. 13, for example, the Defiance County Sheriff’s Office in Ohio submitted a query that listed “flock camera got shot” as the reason for a search. Sgt. Michael Shock told SAN an investigation into the shooting is continuing.
Last Dec. 31, the Brunswick County Sheriff’s Office in Virginia said it was searching the Flock system for “Missing flock camera.” It also said data collected by 21,300 cameras was examined.
‘Hahaha get wrecked’
Searches span timeframes as small as a few hours to several days. And while the majority of investigations appear to encompass just one search, some are much more expansive.
A single employee with the Morgan County Sheriff’s Office in Indiana conducted nine searches on Oct. 29 after a Flock camera was reportedly destroyed. Each query examined data from around 94,054 cameras from Oct. 22 to the date of the search.
Even though some of the audit logs reveal minimal details, a trend of vandalism and destruction against Flock cameras is apparent. Searches show Flock cameras have been subject to everything from minor tampering and theft to gunfire and outright destruction.
In one high-profile incident from October, at least six Flock cameras mounted on poles in the Oregon cities of Eugene and Springfield were cut down and destroyed. A note left on one of the poles made the motive clear: “Hahaha get wrecked ya surveilling f—s.”
While some of the destructive incidents against Flock cameras have garnered widespread attention, including several cases outlined last week in the tech newsletter “Blood in the Machine,” many in the audit logs do not appear to be widely known.
Commander Jon Enos of the Cathedral City Police Department in California confirmed to SAN details concerning a stolen camera after being asked about two searches on July 27 and 28 for just a single camera.
“We had a camera that was stolen from one of the Flock poles they had installed,” Enos said. “We began an investigation and determined the camera had been discarded in a mobile home park in Palm Springs. We were unable to determine who stole the camera, but it was not damaged when we recovered it.”
Not all mentions of destruction are related to vandalism. Capt. Chris Cosgriff with the Fairfax County Police Department in Virginia told SAN that searches made by his department were related to a driver unintentionally running into a camera pole. Chief Janet Moon with the Peachtree City Police Department in Georgia also confirmed that her agency’s searches were tied to a driver who struck a pole while under the influence.
In a statement to the Virginia-based outlet WAVY, a Flock spokesperson, Paris Lewbel, denounced the destruction of the company’s cameras.
“Flock Safety takes damage to our devices seriously, and we appreciate our local law enforcement partners investigating these incidents and holding individuals accountable,” Lewbel said. “We’re proud to support agencies across the country with technology that helps protect communities and solve crime.”
Moving the needle
The search data aggregated by HaveIBeenFlocked has spurred pushback from Flock. Chris van Pelt, the website’s creator, accused Flock last month of using a third-party company to attempt to bring down his service.
Pelt says the third-party company contacted his web hosts to claim that his data — the audit logs released by police departments — not only violates Flock’s intellectual property rights but “poses an immediate threat to public safety and exposes law enforcement officers to danger.”
Pelt’s website remains online.
Flock also called on police departments to be “as vague as permissible” regarding the amount of information it includes in audit logs.
Legislation introduced in Arizona earlier this month, touted as introducing guardrails on the use of license plate reader cameras by law enforcement, includes a section that bans using public records requests to obtain data gathered by the technology.
The vandalism is just a small part of a widespread pushback against Flock’s cameras in communities across the country, many of which have successfully convinced their cities and towns to cancel their contracts with Flock.
Sovern, who is still waiting for his case to reach its eventual conclusion, says that type of opposition is what will move the needle.
“The biggest thing I ask of folks,” he said, “is to reach out to their communities to take these down and for those in my community to do the same.”
Ella Rae Greene, Editor In Chief
