Flock Safety

Lindsey Isaacs, a 23-year-old woman, testified that she was placed in solitary confinement for 86 hours after Flock safety cameras flagged her SUV as connected to a fatal crash. The case is drawing attention to how automated license plate reader systems can implicate people in serious crimes, and to the conditions and due process questions surrounding solitary detention before charges are tested in court.

Surveillance company Flock, a Y Combinator alum from 2017, is pushing to have an online map taken offline that charts the roughly 300,000 automated license plate reader cameras it operates across the United States. The map, published by The Intercept, shows the scale of Flock's camera network in detail. Critics view the takedown effort as an attempt to hide the extent of public-space surveillance, while the company argues it raises safety risks.

The home address of Flock Safety's chief executive has been falsely tagged online as a public toilet, in what looks like a coordinated prank or harassment campaign against the surveillance company's leadership. Flock Safety, which sells license plate readers to police and neighborhoods, has drawn criticism from privacy advocates, making its executives a frequent target of online backlash.