A Flock Safety license plate reader, located on East Adams Street, is pictured here. Credit: Patrick McCarthy | Central Current

As other cities rethink their contracts with surveillance technology manufacturer Flock Safety, privacy and civil rights experts are calling on the Syracuse Police Department to terminate its contract with the embattled company.

Flock Safety was found to have allowed U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents to create accounts with the company and scour driver data from the thousands of local law enforcement agencies that comprise Flock’s national network.

Privacy experts have long-contended that the vehicular movements which license plate readers collect can paint an intimate portrait of an individual’s life.

All the federal agents needed was a single law enforcement agency in the national network to agree to share data with CBP. When some agencies did agree, the federal agents gained access to every shared database in Flock’s national network.

That included the Syracuse Police Department’s database.

From March 10 to May 1, SPD data was included in 175 “CBP-related searches,” according to department spokesman Kieran Coffey.

“We have communicated with Flock, and they have stated that our ALPRs were included in CBP’s searches prior to June,” Coffey said. “SPD did not enter into a data sharing arrangement with those federal agencies, but they were able to access SPD data through the National Lookup Search tool.”

Coffey reiterated that none of those searches was specific to Syracuse’s database alone. 

Even so, the data flowed from Syracuse street corners to a federal immigration agency looking to facilitate president Donald Trump’s mass deportation agenda.

Albert Fox Cahn, the executive director of the Surveillance Technology Oversight Project, slammed SPD’s exposure of Syracuse drivers’ movements. 

“This is a terrifying betrayal of Syracuse residents. These cameras are creepy enough when misused by police, but this sort of attack on immigrant communities is indefensible,” Cahn said. “And this is proof that police can’t be trusted to use technologies this powerful.”

Cahn called on the city to terminate its contract with Flock.

“It’s quite clear that Flock is more of a threat than a boost to residents’ safety, and there’s simply no reason why the police should still do business with this company,” Cahn said.

Syracuse police have said they will continue using Flock’s cameras. 

Flock has faced a slew of scandals throughout the spring and summer, some of which included the Syracuse Police Department.

Central Current in June revealed that the SPD had exposed drivers’ data to more than 5,000 law enforcement agencies around the country.

SPD said it explicitly told Flock that it didn’t want to share data with out-of-state agencies, but the department “inadvertently” opted into sharing data with the national network. SPD Deputy Chief Richard Shoff later explained in a Common Council Public Safety Committee meeting that an out-of-state agency invited SPD to access that agency’s data. Shoff accepted the invitation – not knowing that in doing so, the department was joining the national network it had pledged to avoid.

“If you say ‘yes,’ you are automatically opted in,” Shoff said in the July 22 committee meeting.

Whereas the previously reported data exposure has been characterized as “side door” access for federal agents, the new revelations show CBP’s access to Flock’s data was far more direct than the company had let on – both to inquiring reporters, and to its own clients.

SPD’s failure to protect Syracuse drivers’ sensitive data from CBP broke promises the City of Syracuse and police department made to the Syracuse community when considering and implementing the license plate reader program. 

That news has sparked sharp criticism from Cahn and STOP, as well as the American Civil Liberties Union.

ACLU senior analyst Jay Stanley said that the Syracuse community should terminate its contract with Flock Safety – and should not enter into new contracts with any of Flock’s competitors.

“If the Syracuse police insist on operating license plate scanners, then they should operate license plate scanners. They should buy some scanners and stay away from all this cloud-sharing, nationwide-sharing, and keep it simple and keep it local,” Stanley said.

The experts on Mayor Ben Walsh’s Surveillance Technology Working Group, who reviewed the license plate readers and issued recommendations for the limited use of the tools, warned about the dangers of data-sharing across jurisdictions.

Mark King, one of the mayor’s experts, specifically warned against contracting with Flock Safety in his dissenting opinion, saying it had drawn “unflattering scrutiny” for its data-sharing policies.

King joined New York Civil Liberties Union privacy and technology strategist Daniel Schwarz as the only two working group members to vote against ALPRs in Syracuse. A corresponding public comment period also yielded a negative community view of the technology. 

Stanley said the Syracuse Police Department faces a difficult task if it truly intends to keep sensitive data local and private, because it is storing data in a cloud server with a company that has a clear incentive to push agencies to share data with its national network, and has demonstrated a fast-and-loose approach to data privacy.

“Ultimately, I don’t think that this super powerful surveillance technology should be deployed,” Stanley said, “but if it’s going to be deployed, then it should be something that is truly local and not part of a nationwide surveillance infrastructure.”

Disregarding Flock’s conduct, Stanley said it is untenable to truly keep data local and private, if that data is shared with even a single outside entity. 

He recommended local officials reflect on whether they believe they can collect such significant data sets on the movements of their residents, while simultaneously safeguarding that data from the Trump administration’s extensive reach.

“Even if you choose not to share [with Flock’s national network], if you choose to share it with anybody, then any of those parties that you’re sharing with may have one police officer on the force who decides to, on the down-low, to share the data with ICE,” Stanley said. “And you just can’t control that.”

That exact scenario has already played out, according to investigative news outlet Unraveled, which reported in August that a detective in Palos Heights, Illinois had shared his Flock login credentials with a federal Drug Enforcement Administration agent.

Cahn said these incidents demonstrate the dangers of trusting a privately-owned company that has created a country-spanning surveillance network – and repeatedly misled its clients about its policies, procedures, and partnerships.

“These tools have the power to track nearly every person in a city, creating a constant map of their movements. It’s incompatible with a democracy and ripe for abuse,” Cahn said. “When you drive to school, to work, to church, a doctor’s office, or even a protest, Flock is watching.”

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Patrick McCarthy is a staff reporter at Central Current covering government and politics. A graduate of Syracuse University’s Maxwell and Newhouse Schools, McCarthy was born and raised in Syracuse and...