Privacy, encryption vs. Surveillance state

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Or maybe everyone will convert to Islam. ".. and you get a hijab, and you get hijab" - Oprah
 

Sen. Peters wants to know why ICE bought spyware that can take control of phones​

Washington — The ranking member of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee is demanding that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement explain why it has purchased commercial spyware capable of covertly taking control of phones as well as collecting messages, photographs, location information and other personal data.

Democratic Sen. Gary Peters of Michigan called the purchase "one of the most significant expansions of DHS and ICE's surveillance ambitions to date," flagging potential civil liberties concerns and risks to U.S. national security. Peters sought clarity from Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin in a letter exclusively obtained by CBS News and dated July 23, calling into question ICE's $2 million, sole-source purchase of Graphite, a surveillance tool developed by Paragon Solutions and now owned by REDLattice.

More:

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/othe...ontrol-of-phones/ar-AA28Cd3k?ocid=socialshare

stateofsurveillance.org

Paragon Graphite: The $2M Spyware ICE Uses to Hack Your Phone

ICE contracted Israeli spyware firm Paragon to use Graphite, zero-click malware that can access Signal, WhatsApp, and every app on your phone.
stateofsurveillance.org stateofsurveillance.org
 


🚨#BREAKING: An INSANE story is unfolding in Troy, New York where a mayor who overrode her own city council's vote to END their Flock camera contract, by declaring a "public emergency," is now FUMING after citizens began cutting down the cameras!

The female mayor said that cutting down the cameras was "an act of violence..." and is begging the public to help identify who did it.

This is Troy, New York.

Troy's own City Council... the elected representatives of the people... VOTED to stop the Flock contract over privacy concerns.

They ordered the funding withheld.

So what did the mayor do?

She literally declared a "PUBLIC EMERGENCY" to keep the surveillance cameras running anyway.

So just to be clear:

>The people's representatives said end Flock cams.
>The mayor forced them to stay up by declaring an "emergency."
>She's now being SUED by her own city council over it.
>The council is so alarmed they're trying to STRIP her power to declare emergencies at all.

And when frustrated citizens finally took a few of those cameras down themselves...

...the mayor called that "violence."

One of the wildest stories I've ever seen...
 
His name is Carl Gunn and apparently he's out there every Saturday:

www.fox13news.com

St. Petersburg Flock cameras: Man stages weekly protests over privacy concerns

A retired Florida resident is spending his weekends raising awareness about automated surveillance by protesting outside St. Petersburg Flock cameras.
www.fox13news.com www.fox13news.com

Apparently the police didn't care for his protest and arrested him:

Police pull over to arrest Florida man—for blocking Flock camera on public sidewalk.

He sat holding a 12-foot pool skimmer with sign taped on top.

Today all camera saw was sign:
"Down With Flock Cameras."

A witness offered to help:
"What's your name? I'll come bail you out!"

Carl Gunn, age 77, told a local reporter that 2 police cruisers had already stopped by to interrogate him for at least 15 minutes.

"I have a constitutional right to my privacy," he said.

"I’m a law-abiding citizen, and I don’t need anyone sticking their nose in my business... And if they do, I’m going to chop it off."

Flock cameras create an interconnected network that logs the movements of nearly every vehicle—without warrants.

Enabling broad surveillance that can be shared across agencies and used far beyond solving specific crimes.

Incident occurred in the Coquina Key neighborhood of St. Pete, Florida.

He doesn't have an account on this platform—so posting first full length and credited video here to help raise awareness.
Click to expand...

 
Setting precident

Wichita Man Sues City To Rip Out Its 200-Camera Flock Dragnet​

by Tyler Durden
Friday, Jul 31, 2026 - 09:00 PM
A Wichita machinist, Mason Grimmett, sued his own city this week, arguing that the roughly 200 Flock license-plate readers the police department has bolted around town amount to warrantless dragnet surveillance forbidden by the Kansas Constitution. The complaint, filed in Sedgwick County District Court by the Kansas Justice Institute, does not ask for money - rather, it asks a judge to declare the program unconstitutional and shut it down.

The cameras are made by Flock Safety, one of the largest plate-reader vendors in the country, and Wichita started installing them in 2020. The institute now describes the city as saturated with them - close to 200 AI-powered cameras photographing every passing vehicle and logging its make, model, color, plate, and identifying marks into a searchable database. Grimmett, a lifelong Wichita resident who testified against the program at a public meeting in June, argues that the system violates Section 15 of the state constitution, which guards against unreasonable searches and seizures, and that the city is, in the complaint's language, tracking and databasing law-abiding Kansans "without a warrant, without probable cause, without reasonable suspicion" and without any judicial oversight at all.

more

Wichita Man Sues City To Rip Out Its 200-Camera Flock Dragnet<!-- --> | ZeroHedge

ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero
www.zerohedge.com www.zerohedge.com
 


... Your proposal is ill considered in giving priority to the lesser consideration. Also, F Flock, Axon, Palantir and "privatized" mass surveillance.
 
I thought this was interesting but wanted to know how true it was so I asked Grok.



After asking Grok I realized it's somewhat true. That's why you should always dyodd.

Q
I'm curious about Flock cameras. How many were there in April of 2024 and how many are there now?

A
In April 2024, there was no single precise public figure for the total number of Flock Safety cameras deployed nationwide, but the network was significantly smaller than today—likely in the low tens of thousands at most (with total mapped ALPR cameras across brands still under 5,000 by the end of that year).

Flock had expanded to cameras installed in more than 4,000 cities across 42 states by around that time. Local examples included San Jose, CA, reaching its 235th Flock camera in late April 2024 (with plans to grow further), and other cities/towns deploying dozens to low hundreds. Company employment was over 900, with strong growth but far from peak scale.

As of mid-to-late 2026 (current as of available data around July–August), Flock Safety reports more than 120,000 cameras across 49 states. Independent crowdsourced mapping (e.g., via DeFlock and OpenStreetMap contributors) has verified roughly 95,000–116,000+ ALPR cameras nationwide (with the large majority being Flock units), showing rapid growth especially in 2025–2026. The network reportedly crossed 100,000 in June 2026.

Key Context on Numbers and Growth​

  • Flock's claims: They operate in 5,000+ communities (sometimes cited higher, up to 6,000–12,000 customers including agencies, HOAs, etc.), with over 5,000 law enforcement clients, scanning 20+ billion vehicles monthly.
  • Independent verification: Sites like DeFlock track physical locations; not every camera is mapped, so company figures are higher. Growth accelerated sharply after 2024.
  • Caveats: Exact counts fluctuate with new deployments, contract changes (some cities have canceled or not renewed over privacy/data-sharing concerns), and inclusion of various camera types (e.g., ALPR-focused Falcons plus others). Figures include both public and private installations.
Flock cameras are solar-powered ALPR (automated license plate readers) that capture plates, vehicle details (make, model, color, etc.), and timestamps—but not faces per company statements. They feed into a networked system used by law enforcement and others for investigations. The company highlights crime-solving impacts (e.g., aiding hundreds of thousands to over a million cases annually per their data), while critics raise privacy and surveillance concerns.

For the most up-to-date or location-specific info, check resources like deflock.org or official Flock statements, or submit public records requests to local agencies. Numbers continue to evolve quickly.
 


This woman received a summons to appear in court for theft based on flock camera evidence that she was stealing packages. The problem for law enforcement is that she had her own cameras set up, which absolutely proved that it wasn’t her. The officer refused to show her the evidence at her door because he said that she was arguing with him and not being forthright. When you look at the camera footage, it is two totally different people. He absolutely was refusing to cooperate with her. He was convinced that the camera footage showed her, even though she had camera footage to prove that it wasn’t. This is the danger of these cameras. Law enforcement in some cases is using and abusing them.

Ultimately, she was able to prove her innocence using her own camera footage, but what if she didn’t have her own cameras set up?
 


Whoa, it isn't a coincidence... the Flock narrative releases are accelerating at a frequency way beyond Flock itself...

Zoom out with me and look at the pattern… Flock stories are hitting faster and getting more serious...

Officers abusing access, cities canceling contracts, states moving restrictions and members of Congress now pushing legislation...

What started as a local crime tool quietly became a privately run national surveillance grid… scanning vehicles, mapping movement, linking associations and letting thousands of camera networks be searched without a warrant...

Then Rep. Marlin Stutzman felt it reach all the way to his driveway over an expired registration… and immediately joined the effort to rein it in...

Now walk it up the ladder… go with me on this... this is only building scaffolding to what's coming...

Flock is the part everyone can see... above it sits the private data market...

AI location tracking, backdoor government searches, FISA and the surveillance structure built after 9/11 through the Patriot Act... {{{bell goes off}}}

This may be the public onramp into something much bigger… expose the cameras first, follow the data upstream and put the entire warrantless surveillance system in front of the American people... let them feel it...

Flock may simply be the first layer coming off... hmm... 👁
 

As repossessions rise, license plate readers aren't just for cops anymore​

Law enforcement's uses and abuses of Flock cameras have made headlines regularly these days, but Flock isn't the only company putting these mass surveillance machines to work. As repossessions are skyrocketing because buyers can't afford their own cars, the repo men are using automatic license plate readers (ALPRs) to find cars they're looking for more quickly and efficiently, reports Automotive News.

While Flock has the largest network of fixed ALPRs in the country (about 90,000 according to ZD Net), repo men rely instead on mobile cameras, which Flock does not currently offer. That's where companies like Digital Recognition Network come in, which has been bringing this technology to the private sector for years. Over 1,000 clients use DRN's technology and data, mainly for asset protection and repossession purposes.

More:

https://www.msn.com/en-us/autos/oth...for-cops-anymore/ar-AA29IXdb?ocid=socialshare
 
Goldhedge said:
Ultimately, she was able to prove her innocence using her own camera footage, but what if she didn’t have her own cameras set up?
Click to expand...
It's a real problem. There's thousands of cases of roadway accidents, where the other party and a few witnesses all say one thing, but a dashcam video proves the opposite.

We are living, now, in a world of lies, and of liars...some of whom will tell a lie just for the thrill of it, when the truth would serve better.

Our society, from colonization, was built around TRUST. That's evaporating. You want to see what a low-trust society looks like? Sub-Saharan Africa. Where nothing productive is done because no one can be trusted - to trade with, to honor property rights, to in fact DO anything.
 
pmbug said:
Click to expand...


searcher said:

As repossessions rise, license plate readers aren't just for cops anymore​

Law enforcement's uses and abuses of Flock cameras have made headlines regularly these days, but Flock isn't the only company putting these mass surveillance machines to work. As repossessions are skyrocketing because buyers can't afford their own cars, the repo men are using automatic license plate readers (ALPRs) to find cars they're looking for more quickly and efficiently, reports Automotive News.

While Flock has the largest network of fixed ALPRs in the country (about 90,000 according to ZD Net), repo men rely instead on mobile cameras, which Flock does not currently offer. That's where companies like Digital Recognition Network come in, which has been bringing this technology to the private sector for years. Over 1,000 clients use DRN's technology and data, mainly for asset protection and repossession purposes.

More:

https://www.msn.com/en-us/autos/oth...for-cops-anymore/ar-AA29IXdb?ocid=socialshare
Click to expand...


I know for a fact that repo companies have been using ALPR's for over a decade now.

In cities, people are paid to drive through residential neighborhoods at night scanning license plates, looking for everything thing from reposessable cars to stolen cars or anything else they can find wrong.
 
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