Growing concerns over Flock cameras in Columbia mirror national debate over surveillance technology
COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)
Growing concerns over the use of Flock Safety cameras in Columbia are part of a larger national debate over privacy, data sharing and the expanding use of artificial intelligence in law enforcement.
Two University of Missouri students brought those concerns to the Columbia City Council on July 20, questioning what information the cameras can collect, who can access it and how long that information remains available.
The students cited Flock’s alleged ability to scan faces and pointed to the company’s own website, which says its technology can search for visual characteristics such as clothing. Flock currently advertises its FreeForm technology as allowing authorized users to search video using descriptions such as a “man in blue shirt and cowboy hat.” The company claims the feature does not use facial recognition or biometric identification.
The students also raised concerns about the security and anonymity of information stored by the system, arguing that the technology could move the country toward a surveillance state that could be used to target people. They called on the city to cancel its contract with Flock.
Similar concerns have also fueled a local grassroots effort. Krista Murray-Salisbury, founder of Get The Flock Out Of Columbia, said she first became interested in the technology after noticing a series of new cameras while driving through Columbia. After she began researching how the Columbia Police Department was using Flock, she came across the department’s transparency portal.
Murray-Salisbury claims information was removed from the portal faster than it was updated during the six weeks she was researching the system, though she was unable to provide specific examples when asked.
“The more I looked into Flock’s terms of service, the more I looked into the history of how this technology has come about and the more I read of the interviews with the founder of the company, the more concerned I became,” Murray-Salisbury said.
Murray-Salisbury said she would prefer the city invest in community policing and deescalation specialists rather than Flock technology.
“I’m a concerned citizen who does not want an unregulated information empire running an AI to have access to my children’s whereabouts as they walk to and from school every day,” Murray-Salisbury said. “But I would be perfectly happy knowing the name and the badge number of the beat cop assigned to my beat.”
She said she believes the biggest difference is accountability, arguing residents have more ability to identify and hold individual police officers accountable than they do a private company operating an artificial intelligence system. That is one of several concerns Murray-Salisbury has about how Flock data is handled outside Columbia and Missouri.
“We have very little transparency about where that [Flock data] goes outside of the state of Missouri. But that cop I know who signs their checks, there are contingencies in place for misbehavior.”
The Columbia City Council had voted 5-2 in favor of implementing Flock cameras on Oct. 7, 2024. At the time, Flock Safety cameras were advertised as being able to capture images of license plates under various conditions.
A separate camera system called Fusus was denied by the City Council 4-3 in November 2022 following community pushback.
CPD defends Flock systemThe Columbia Police Department said it has no plans to end its relationship with Flock.
Assistant Chief Lance Bolinger, of the CPD Investigative Bureau, told ABC 17 News the department’s 2025 Annual Surveillance Report, presented to the City Council in June, documented successful uses of the system.
Bolinger pointed specifically to the arrest of Andrew Acton in a Boone County homicide investigation. Bolinger said that case would have been difficult to solve without Flock because the system provided crucial evidence to investigators.
Murray-Salisbury also questioned whether the benefits of Flock justify the cost. She said she believes the city could instead put that money toward traditional policing strategies and community-based programs.
“Community policing initiatives work to decrease crime rates, and they do so with backing. We don’t have the data to know how much these AI-driven systems actually help and how much they hurt,” Murray-Salisbury said. “But we do know how much they cost and right now that’s the tune of like $3 million in five years for the City of Columbia that my tax dollars are paying more than a half-a-million-dollars for the police department to watch people walk across an intersection and then have that data scraped by an AI.”
Columbia currently has 114 Flock cameras, according to the department’s transparency portal. In the past 30 days, the system detected 988,338 vehicles and recorded 505 searches.
Murray-Salisbury said her concerns are not about reducing police accountability or public safety. She said she supports keeping crime rates low and providing police officers with good wages, but opposes giving a private, artificial-intelligence system access to data collected from vehicles and people.
“I’m 100% here for keeping crime rates low or having accountability in policing for being able to pay officers living wages so that they can have a meaningful vocation and take care of their families. One hundred percent,” she said. “I am completely against having an AI we have no control over, scrape the data of every vehicle and every face of every interaction within the scope of that camera.”
She also pointed to the growing use of home security cameras such as Ring, arguing that criminals can adapt to surveillance technology by disabling or avoiding cameras. She siad she has also seen a growing number of Flock cameras vandalized.
“If a company comes in and goes, we can offer you citywide surveillance that will address the deficits in the police department and help you. Then they can do that by complying with ordinances that have been written and become law in the city around the safety of their citizens and their data,” Murray-Salisbury said.
CPD said its use of Flock is subject to safeguards. The department’s 2025 surveillance report says searches of the system require a documented justification or case number and that user activity is logged. The department says Flock data is automatically deleted after 30 days unless retention is extended under agency policy or legal requirements. CPD also says it only shares data with other law enforcement agencies within Missouri.
Bolinger said the department understands there are concerns about the technology, but believes its documented investigative successes demonstrate its value.
“I understand there are critics in the media and in the public regarding the Flock System,” he said. “However, at the end of the day, we can provide numerous documented successful outcomes resulting from the use of the system, while we have not identified any serious misconduct involving its use.”
CPD also disputes the idea that Flock is operating without meaningful oversight. Bolinger claims the department has identified some procedural issues with the system, but said none have involved malicious intent or misconduct.
“This technology has received as much oversight as any system I have seen during my 20 years in policing,” he said. “The few issues that have been identified have been procedural in nature, and none have been found to involve malicious intent or misconduct.”
CPD says it will continue to allow oversight while emphasizing the role Flock has played in investigations and public safety.
“We will continue to welcome appropriate oversight and accountability, but the discussion should also recognize the significant number of successful outcomes the Flock System has helped facilitate and the value it provides to our officers in helping make our community a safer place to live,” Bolinger said.
Murray-Salisbury, however, said her concerns go beyond how CPD currently uses the system. Asked whether she believes the public was misled when CPD said the cameras could only read license plates, she said she does not believe department officials understood the full capabilities of the technology when the system was introduced.
“I don’t believe that CPD was aware of the ulterior motives that have become very clear in the statements coming out from Flock. Flock came to a lot of municipalities and other entities, like private businesses with a security program that would decrease the need to employ physical people. I’m a union girl. I always want you to employ more people every time,” Murray-Sailsbury said. “Flock has continued to ship out technology that is increasing faster than we can write legislation in order to keep our people safe. The cameras that are installed today that were produced in a factory in 2026 have the capability of reading all of the Internet-connected devices within a vehicle all the way down to the tire pressure sensor and the wearables on the person.”
Flock’s current public materials describe its license plate reader technology as capturing vehicle evidence, including time, location and visible vehicle characteristics. Its newer video tools can search for people based on observable characteristics such as clothing, but the company says those people searches are separate from its license plate reader cameras and do not use facial recognition.
Murray-Salisbury said that distinction does not resolve her concerns, arguing the technology could lead officers to rely too heavily on information generated by an artificial intelligence system.
“We’re doing it with a camera that is seeing way more than just the license plate,” she said. “Then we’re ending up in a situation where ethically the police officer is assuming that Flock is right. They are removing the innocent until proven guilty.”
She said more than 70 people contacted her during the first two months of organizing Get The Flock Out Of Columbia who wanted to get involved.
Debate spreads across MissouriThe debate is not limited to Columbia. Pettis County Sheriff Brad Anders addressed concerns about automated license plate readers, or ALPRs, in a social media post Thursday, saying there are “numerous misconceptions” about the technology and its use.
Anders shared a community guide written by another sheriff that explains how ALPR technology works and the safeguards law enforcement agencies use.
The guide says ALPR systems capture license plates and visible vehicle characteristics, including a vehicle’s make, model and color, as well as the date, time and location of the camera. It also says ALPR systems do not photograph drivers or passengers for identification, record conversations, access cellphones or monitor internet activity.
Anders wrote that he understands why residents have questions about the technology but supports its continued use when it is properly regulated.
“There is a lot of discussion concerning ALPRs, Flock cameras specifically, both locally and nationwide. Unfortunately, there are also numerous misconceptions about what they are, their use, and their value. I understand the concerns as presented, but many of those concerns may be misguided,” the post says.
The guide says law enforcement can use ALPR systems to investigate stolen vehicles, missing people, hit-and-run crashes, burglaries, robberies, violent crimes and homicides. It also says searches should be limited to legitimate law enforcement purposes, logged and auditable, with information generally deleted after about 30 days unless it is retained as evidence.
Anders’ statement also emphasized the technology is not intended to replace traditional police work.
“ALPR technology is not a replacement for traditional police work, nor do they establish probable cause or determine guilt,” the post says. “They are simply one investigative tool among many that helps investigators develop leads more quickly and allocate resources more effectively.”
Other Missouri communities continue to use the technology, as well. St. Charles, Missouri, approved nearly $50,000 in 2026 for fixed long-range license plate reader cameras, while other municipalities have renewed or expanded their Flock agreements. Fulton had approved the use of Flock in 2024.
Calls to stop Flock camera spreads nationallyAcross the country, however, some communities are moving in the opposite direction.
Reporting NPR and other national outlets show a growing number of cities have canceled their contracts with Flock, and CNN reported earlier this year that Ring had backed out of its partnership with Flock. A national tracker of Flock contract cancellations lists dozens of communities that have ended agreements amid concerns over privacy, data sharing and law enforcement access.
The issue has also been complicated by security concerns. According to a report from Fox affiliate WFLX, researchers found more than 60 Flock Condor camera feeds publicly accessible online without password protection. The exposed systems reportedly allowed people to view live video and, in some cases, access archived footage and camera controls.
The national conversation has also focused on how Flock’s interconnected network can allow law enforcement agencies to share information across jurisdictions. Flock says its system is built around permission-based sharing and that customers control their data. The company says searches are logged and reviewable and that shared access is governed by permissions.
Critics argue that the network creates the possibility of information collected locally being accessed beyond the community where it was captured.
That debate reached Capitol Hill this week. U.S. Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Kentucky) posted on social media on July 25 that he plans to introduce legislation that would withhold federal money from municipalities and police departments that use Flock and similar cameras.
I’ll soon be sponsoring a bill to withhold federal money from municipalities and police departments that deploy Flock (and other style) cameras to surveil law abiding citizens. pic.twitter.com/FGzE69psxS
— Thomas Massie (@RepThomasMassie) July 25, 2026
“I’ll soon be sponsoring a bill to withhold federal money from municipalities and police departments that deploy Flock (and other style) cameras to surveil law-abiding citizens,” Massie wrote.
The national debate comes as Flock continues to expand. The company says its technology is now used by thousands of communities nationwide and that its systems have supported more than 1 million cases.
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