<a href="https://stateofsurveillance.org/articles/surveillance/flock-safety-surveillance-network/" target="_blank" rel="noopener nofollow">Flock cameras scan ~20 billion license plates a month.</a>
Multiple snapshots per vehicle. Driver included. Stored in a database accessible to law enforcement and government agencies. They say photos are deleted after 30 days (everyone says that)
A tattoo artist in Washington filed public record requests for the footage. Some cities complied. Others refused, two cities argued the footage shouldn’t be public…for “privacy reasons.”
Let that sink in.
When citizens ask for access, it’s a privacy issue. When the state collects it at scale, it’s public safety. How ironic. So privacy protects institutions - but not the public being recorded?
This is exactly why the question “What does privacy even mean?” matters.
The thing is - If we can’t clearly define what privacy means, it becomes whatever is convenient. I unpacked that foundation here, check it out:
<a href="https://www.sknexus.org/p/privacy-vs-security-explained" target="_blank" rel="noopener nofollow">Privacy Is Not Security - The Difference is Important</a>

Knowledge by Execution - Breaking Down Tech for the Mango Man (Aam Aadmi/Regular Person) - https://www.sknexus.org/

SK NEXUS

Flock cameras scan approximately 20 billion license plates monthly, storing images accessible to law enforcement with claimed 30-day deletion policies. When a Washington tattoo artist requested public records of this footage, some cities refused citing privacy concerns - the same privacy not extended to citizens being recorded. This contradiction highlights how privacy definitions become convenient tools for institutions rather than protections for the public, raising fundamental questions about what privacy actually means in practice.

Who Gets Privacy in the Age of License Plate Tracking?