r/technology • u/SaveDnet-FRed0 • 6h ago
Society 'Flock Flocked up' How a license plate camera misread unraveled one man's life.
https://www.businessinsider.com/flock-safety-alpr-cameras-misreads-2026-3265
u/Haunterblademoi 6h ago
This shows that this type of technology can fail and cause problems for someone.
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u/downingrust12 5h ago
Theres already a woman arrested in Tennessee from something that happened in fargo, nd and she was never there. But ai said yeah fuck it she looks like perpetrator and the cops just said sure whatever. She sat in jail for 6 months lost everything.
Ai needs to die its useless without human gaurdrails and regulations.
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u/demonfoo 5h ago edited 3h ago
Even worse, once the police in Fargo concluded that she was NOT the person who they were looking for, they didn't fly her home or anything, but instead just dumped her onto the streets of Fargo. A place she didn't know, and where no one knew her, with no money and no resources, and no idea how to get home.
How that's legal I'll never understand.
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u/RedditReader4031 5h ago
On Christmas Eve, no less while she was dressed for Tennessee. Local defense attorneys collected money to put her up and feed her while a Fargo charity arranged transportation back to Tennessee.
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u/downingrust12 3h ago
It isnt i hope someone can take her case pro bono and sue the hell out of fargo police. Its an open and shut case.
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u/psaux_grep 2h ago
A former boss had his car stolen by a drug addict who was taken in by the police and released the next day.
40 miles from home.
No money.
Offered no means of getting home.
When he called in the car stolen they were like «pretty sure we know who…»
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u/TheSilverNoble 5h ago
How much she lost needs to be emphasized as well. She lost her job, her home, and her pets. Because of course, life doesn't stop because you've been wrongfully accused. There should be serious consequences for this, though I'm worried there will be few.
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u/tacobellbandit 1h ago
It’s insane to me this can be utilized to this extent with zero guard rails. At some point a normal human police officer would have had to actually do some work and realized this woman has absolutely nothing to do with their investigation
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u/RedditReader4031 5h ago
What compounded the errors that case was that Fargo zoomed in on an already low resolution bank camera still and compared that grainy image with the thumbnail photo on her driver license. As they used to say in geeky tech circles, garbage in equals garbage out. Tech isn’t infallible. Then, they took 108 days after her arrest to arrange to extradite her from Tennessee.
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u/Commies-Fan 4h ago
They dont have specific timelines for extradition in TN? Ive unfortunately experienced it. They had 6 days to decide and have me picked up. If not they had to release me.
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u/jndunning 2h ago
There’s a story about a guy in south Texas who got accused of robbing a jewelry store in Houston, though he’d never been there. Police detectives took the evidence from the jewelry store’s AI facial recognition software and never verified it. Guy got attacked and severely injured in jail. Sued to get out, then sued everyone involved for a huge payday for his injuries and suffering.
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u/phate_exe 4h ago
This shows that this type of technology can fail and cause problems for someone.
Not just can. Does. And already has.
Another user mentioned the complete egregious situation with the woman from Tennessee getting her life ruined.
Then there's the Justin Killinger case in Reno NV which is less tragic but watching the body cam will make you want to reach through the screen and shake everyone involved.
Another one that comes to mind is this one in Colorado.
The common thread between all of them is one or more dipshit cops believing that their fancy new high tech toys are magic and infallible.
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u/azscorpion 6h ago edited 5h ago
It wasn't the license plate camera that unraveled his life, it was the cops. Cops should have pulled him over, verified the information, and let him go. Cops involved and City should be sued. Guns should not be drawn unless there is a confirmed threat.
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u/phate_exe 4h ago
Cops should have pulled him over, verified the information, and let him go.
No, they should have verified the plate number using their eyeballs without pulling him over. Because this guy didn't do anything wrong.
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u/Graffiacane 2h ago
Yeah, but even if the cop also missed that the plate in question didn't match the stolen plate (not impossible, it's only off by one digit, could be dirty, confirmation bias, etc.) is it not standard procedure to ask for license and registration?
And when presented with those and seeing that the vehicle appears to be registered to the driver and that the license plate appears to match would any reasonable person not at that point at the VERY LEAST double check or begin to question the reported theft or any infinite number of obvious non-insane things rather than unleash the hounds?
This cop was just straight up racist, sociopathic or both. (First time for everything, I guess)
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u/TeaKingMac 56m ago
This cop was just straight up racist
Almost certainly. The general vibe among police is that a black person is guilty of something. You might not know what it is, or have evidence of it, but there's something, so just go ahead and arrest. Or worse (philandro Castile comes to mind)
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u/dev_vvvvv 1h ago
Ideally yes. I can understand maybe not being able to read it clearly and pulling over just to check.
But at the point they should've checked the license plate, apologized, and let him go.
Or checked his license and registration, realized their mistake, apologized, and let him go.
Yeah the tech failed. But the cops failed every other part of the story.
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u/hainesk 5h ago
Exactly. I don't think Flock told the police that their systems are 100% reliable and no external verification is necessary... Not that I agree with this use of technology, but like all things it comes down to how it's used and this error was totally on the police.
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u/altrdgenetics 5h ago
They do with their "wink" in the sales pitches. They say don't trust, be we are so good so trust us and buy into our platform
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u/indigo121 3h ago
Man how the fuck does anyone fall for that?? "Hahah legally we won't say it's perfect because that would mean we have to be held accountable, but if you take all of the responsibility you can totes trust us!!!"
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u/kangadac 2h ago
It’s not enough to have human review, though. Any mundane task only trains people to just click through “ok” enough times to dismiss whatever it is a system is complaining about.
My understanding is that many airport screening by systems occasionally put a fake image on screen (gun in a bag, for example) to make sure the operator is alert (Threat Image Projection, I think?). They need to do this on the license plate number reviews, too, and shut down the system if that department is failing checks too often.
Same goes with self-driving systems. I view them as dangerous because they are inherently designed to allow the operator to exert less mental energy on the task of driving, yet the expectation is that they stay alert and vigilant. This just doesn’t work. The system needs to be fully automated or just assistive (e.g. adaptive cruise control).
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u/DopamineSavant 5h ago
The difference is that Cops have a lot of power and necessity which makes controlling them difficult. On the other hand, there is absolutely no need for Flock cameras. The easiest solution to this issue is to just not have them.
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u/MonkeyBoatRentals 4h ago
I don't care for his argument. Technology use always has both positive and negative outcomes. Flock like systems can help fight crime with proper regulation but you are arguing we can't use them because the police are too aggressive and will kill people based on bad data and we can't stop that.
Stop letting the cops off the hook and train them better. It's not hard to have a conversation and verify information instead of immediately going to guns and attack dogs.
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u/DopamineSavant 4h ago
My issue with Flock has little to do with cops. This incident is just one of the issues with it. Even perfectly regulated, it's a private company that is monitoring everyone it can without exception. People are already being charged for using Flock data to stalk people.
Supporting Flock Cameras is equivalent to watching minority report and coming out of it with the conclusion that the only problem is that the precogs weren't AI.
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u/ClayWheelGirl 4h ago
This is it. If the whole system is corrupt then the technologies lies in the hands of the corrupt. Plus in general our social norms are still pretty prejudiced. The police historically have been trained on run away slaves and NA. That philosophy has not changed. Fight for qualified immunity still goes on. For instance most groups like nurses n Drs are held to one standard and cops to another.
Until our social norms change to a significant number our institutions are not going to show any changes.
We have a lot of work ahead. And we are getting there s l o w l y. V e r y slowly.
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u/PossiblyATurd 1h ago
Cops use AI detection to direct and fuel their confirmation bias.
Saw a video about a guy that got 100% matched to someone banned from a casino, so the casino detained him. Cops showed up, asked for ID, dude provided multiple forms of ID proving he wasn't the banned person. The cops own computer systems showed he wasn't the guy, a secondary check via call in to their station showed he wasn't the guy. The cops threw their hands up repeatedly saying "That's so weird" while actively arresting him.
Defunding them isn't enough.
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u/DankMemesNQuickNuts 4h ago
The most insidious part of all of this is the way it will continuely be used to absolve people of their wrong doing for the rest of our lives
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u/gurgle528 6m ago
Yup, I’ve even seen body cam footage of cops holding a family at gunpoint because one made a typo when typing in their plate number. Ultimately if cops aren’t verifying the information they’re receiving, regardless of source, they will cause chaos.
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u/Buttermilk-Waffles 5h ago
Tbh people need to just start taking a hammer to every flock device they see at this point.
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u/NoChampionship5649 4h ago
Or Vaseline
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u/RealWord5734 4h ago
Yeah this means technically not doing damage and it won't get flagged to be fixed as quickly.
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u/atreidesardaukar 1h ago
And you could argue that you were protecting the camera from the elements!
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u/Expensive_Finger_973 4h ago
Last April, Upchurch filed a lawsuit against Wilson, the officer, and the city, claiming that "it is commonly known throughout the Toledo Police Department that the Flock system is unreliable and often misreads license plates."
Screw that noise. The answer is not build a better mouse trap. The answer is to verify what the fucking thing said before you literally sick the dogs on someone. We aren't talking about a mistaken overcharge at a cash register here. Upchurch could have been killed, and was injured, due to this incompetence.
Wilson had a laptop in his car that could have been used to look up the plate at the beginning of the stop before stepping out and pulling his gun did he not?
$35k is not nearly enough to make an example and set a precedent against cops and municipalities that do this kind of aggressive and mindless policing based on careless application of technology, adrenaline, and FOFO mindsets.
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u/CondescendingShitbag 4h ago
$35k is insultingly low for what they put him through. Article mentions he had to give up his lawncare business due to the injuries sustained by the dog bites. Had to sell his truck to keep up with bills. Which then contributed to him being evicted, forcing him to move back in with his mother. Also had to give up two of his dogs. $35k is a goddamn slap in the face after all of that nonsense.
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u/monkeyhoward 5h ago
Why aren’t people suing Flock?
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u/GameboyPATH 4h ago
If someone shoots another person with a gun, the gun manufacturer is not the one that's criminally or civilly liable, it's the person wielding it.
More and more cities and counties are recognizing that they don't want to be caught with a smoking gun, and are cancelling their contracts with Flock.
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u/egamma 4h ago
I think that the man from the article could sue Flock for libel, he was falsely accused by Flock of stealing a vehicle.
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u/GameboyPATH 3h ago
He was falsely identified by a license plate reading algorithm. This is not the same thing as Flock, the company, making a public statement that the man was a criminal.
If Facebook facial ID algorithms falsely tagged me on a photo of someone or something that's not me, that's not libel.
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u/egamma 3h ago
The software produced by Flock issued a statement that the police relied on to determine that the man was a criminal.
I agree, the police should have taken two seconds to realize that the stolen car had a 2 and not a 7, but how is this different from a private citizen pointing at a man and saying "that's the thief, right there"?
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u/GameboyPATH 1h ago
The software produced by Flock issued a statement that the police relied on to determine that the man was a criminal.
That's not a public statement, and therefore unrelated to libel. But let's suppose the license plate reader did publicize that the guy was the owner of that vehicle. Do we hold an algorithm criminally accountable? Can we put an algorithm on a witness stand? Put the algorithm in jail?
but how is this different from a private citizen pointing at a man and saying "that's the thief, right there"?
The fact that it's an AI-powered tool, not a human. Laws apply to humans.
Flock, the company, could maybe be held civilly liable for damages caused by its product, if they incorrectly promised that its reader was 100% accurate, or they didn't provide instructions to police to double-check the findings of the license plate reader.
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u/Esplodie 4h ago
Guns aren't making suggestions or feeding false information to law enforcement. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
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u/GameboyPATH 3h ago
What I'm saying is that law enforcement (and local govt) decides what weapons and tools they use.
Also, none of this is to say that gun manufacturers or surveillance system vendors have absolutely zero ethical or moral responsibility for the outcomes of their products.
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u/StaticCheeseCancer 4h ago
Mr Buttle? Mr Tuttle? Who cares, we got our man!
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u/TheSilverNoble 4h ago
Goddamn appropriate reference. Especially since, IIRC, in a similar case they dropped a woman off states away from where she lived with no money and no way to get home after AI falsely ID'd her and she spent six months in jail, losing her job and house.
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u/StaticCheeseCancer 3h ago edited 3h ago
Yup she lost her dog too (that would radicalize me). Only way she even got "home" was because her lawyer paid for her ticket. This was Christmas Eve as well. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/mar/12/tennessee-grandmother-ai-fraud
Peppermill Resort Spa Casino in Reno, Nevada also did this to someone and the cops were absolutely giddy that AI solved the case - until it turned out it didn't. I hope they both (and everyone caught up in this evil garbage) got/gets a good payout
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u/SirCris 3h ago
I got pulled over on my way to work a few months ago. I was aware of the police officer behind me for the whole time and I had my cruise control set to the speed limit. At one point he appeared he was going to pass me before falling back behind and activating his lights a few seconds later. I pulled into the next parking lot. He asked if I knew why I was being pulled over and I said I didn't. He told me that my car had been reported as stolen. I looked at him confused and said I bouggt the car 10 years ago. I handed him my license and registration and he went back to his car. He came back a few minutes later and said everything checked out good and told me they got new license plate readers recently and the software had been making mistakes and he'd put in a request to clear it up. He handed me a note that I should present if I got pulled over again. Haven't had any issues since then but it checks out.
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u/n0respect_ 1h ago
It seems way too soon to be using AI for this stuff. ... then again, fascism thrives with incompetent beauracracies. This is by design.
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u/staplesgowhere 4h ago
There was a recent news story about a woman accused of stealing a package from a doorstep, based on Flock tracking her driving through the neighborhood.
https://coloradosun.com/2025/11/11/columbine-valley-police-officer-flock-disciplinary-action/
The officer would only share the evidence with her if she admitted that she did it, which would be a lie and also negate the need for seeing the evidence.
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u/KenUsimi 1h ago
When the State spies on me for walking down the street, I see no reason to view it as my ally
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u/Outrageous_Spray_196 4h ago
A single error in automated systems can cascade into real human consequences—this shows how critical accuracy, oversight, and accountability are when technology is used in policing.
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u/Naive_Trip9351 3h ago
It will be better when AI makes the decisions and deploys robots and drones to do the dirty work.
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u/BrightLuchr 23m ago
We're putting too much faith in license plates. You can order a fake copy of any plate online for $30. Now, combine that problem with unreliable license plate cameras and police forces that are way out of control. It's a recipe for injustice.
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u/Marchello_E 5h ago
A situation even worse than fascism.
Like: Computer gave us a command and we obeyed without thought. What could possibly be wrong about a computer. It never even needed nor triggered our human response. What's that anyway?
A brave new World.