Florida and Texas are moving to block Flock's license plate cameras from operating in their states.
Flock runs a searchable network of roughly 130,000 automated license plate readers scattered across the country. The cameras log passing vehicles and feed that data into a system law enforcement agencies can search. Now two states are pushing back, moving to restrict Flock's cameras over privacy and civil liberties concerns. The pushback has support from both sides of the aisle, an unusual show of bipartisan agreement on a tech regulation question.
That bipartisan alignment is the real story here. A searchable network of plate readers at this scale looks less like a traditional policing tool and more like infrastructure for tracking where people go, and lawmakers on the right and left both seem to see it that way. If Florida and Texas follow through, they hand other statehouses a template for reining in surveillance systems that expanded with little public debate.
Flock built its business selling convenience to police departments one contract at a time. State legislatures may be the first check on that growth that actually sticks.