I’m the developer behind FlockHopper, a free app that shows you where license plate cameras are and gives you a route that avoids them.

I just came across this clip of a cop describing it as a tool for drug dealers. To him, the only reason anyone would route around these cameras is that they’re up to something. It’s the same old line: if you have nothing to hide, why would you care?

But you shouldn’t need a good reason to not want to be tracked on your daily drive. Not wanting your daily commute logged in a searchable database shouldn't be suspicious.

DontGetFlocked.com

IDK about other states, but here in Ohio a lot of our politicians are suddenly very concerned about Flock, a few weeks before the election. We felt it worth calling out.

Flock has been in Lake County since at least 2021. Willoughby, Eastlake and Mentor-on-the-Lake were already running cameras back then. Lake County Commissioner John Plecnik (R) has been a commissioner that whole time, and he only started posting about Flock in the past couple of weeks. I'm not buying he's sincere.

Pushed to restrict or ban it:

- State Rep. Tristan Rader (D-Lakewood) co-introduced a bipartisan statewide ban on license plate readers in September.

- Reps. Levi Dean (R-Xenia), Justin Pizzulli (R-Scioto County) and Darnell Brewer (D-Cleveland) joined Rader in asking ODOT to stop issuing permits for these cameras on state roads and review the ones already up.

- Hamilton County Sheriff Charmaine McGuffey pulled the plug on her department's 75 Flock cameras in early October.

Regulate it but keep it:

- Rep. Al Cutrona (R-Canfield): keep the cameras, add data rules, make misuse a felony.

- Keith Faber (R), running for Attorney General: same idea, keep them, punish misuse.

Late and vague:

- Vivek Ramaswamy (R), running for governor, posted in late August that he has "zero tolerance" for a surveillance state, but still hasn't said what he'd actually do.

- Amy Acton (D) started at a "comprehensive overview" and later came out for a statewide ban.

Residents in Hamilton, Oxford, Eastlake and all over have been showing up to council meetings and protests for months. The politicians are following us, not leading. Ask everyone on your ballot where they stand, and when they started caring.

Sources:

https://www.wvxu.org/politics/2026-10-16/faq-flock-cameras-ohio-kentucky-midterm-election

https://www.statenews.org/government-politics/2026-08-18/republican-lawmakers-draft-bills-to-regulate-flock-cameras-in-ohio

https://ohiohouse.gov/members/tristan-rader/news/rep-rader-supports-statewide-flock-ban-we-cant-compromise-yet-148239

https://www.nbc4i.com/news/politics/ohio-lawmakers-ask-odot-to-halt-certain-flock-cameras-installations/amp/

Despite the CEO consistently claiming that Flock has never been hacked, Flock later admitted to customers that there were data breaches back in November of 2025. This is just further proof that Flock Safety and potentially other ALPR manufacturers will lie to local governments, businesses, and American citizens about how the data is used and who has access.

Safety first!

My neighbour just install security camera towards my house.It is very annoying,they always watching us so i want to get rid of it

A bug that would allow the Meta Ray-Ban second and third generation smart glasses to listen to you without the "Hey Meta?" trigger has been patched. It's yet another way that big tech claims plausible deniability while gathering information on countless people.

This comes after a controversy around the Meta AI questions revealing location data of minors. Significant questions about the company need to be raised as to what exactly they do with all this data they've been collecting on us without our permission (particularly when someone's friend has these Meta glasses and your privacy is invaded because of it).

At what point does the American public get to say no to mass surveillance? What will it take for the government to outlaw surveillance and amend privacy into the constitution? This is something that affects every American whether they like it or not. Who gets to decide our rights in the modern free world?

Related discussion and news regarding the 4th amendment: https://www.reddit.com/r/4thAmendment/

A police lieutenant in a Cincinnati suburb has been indicted on a felony charge for allegedly using his department’s Flock license plate reader cameras to track someone he knew.

Walter Cordes, 48, a lieutenant with the Sharonville Police Department, searched the Flock system 29 times between Dec. 19, 2024, and April 20, 2026, to find the person’s whereabouts for personal reasons unrelated to police work, according to the Hamilton County Prosecutor’s Office.

A grand jury indicted him Oct. 13 on one count of unauthorized use of a computer, cable or telecommunication property. The charge is a fifth-degree felony that carries up to 12 months in prison under Ohio law. Prosecutors have not identified the person Cordes allegedly tracked or said why he searched for them.

The searches came to light in June when Cordes self-reported during a department audit of the system, then admitted to them in an interview, prompting an investigation by the Hamilton County Sheriff’s Office. Sharonville Police Chief Jim Nesbit told WKRC the audit turned up other improper use, which the department addressed, and that “Lt. Cordes came forward to share that he too had misused the system.” Sharonville leases 24 Flock cameras, and the department said Cordes has been placed on administrative leave while it finishes its own investigation.

Read more [paywall removed for Redditors]: https://fortune.com/2026/10/14/ohio-police-lieutenant-flock-cameras-indicted-felony-charge/?utm_source=reddit/