Boulder police to renew contract with Flock, the license plate reader company under scrutiny

The Boulder Police Department will renew its contract with Flock, an automatic license plate reader company that has faced increased pushback over privacy concerns and data sharing with Immigration and Customs Enforcement. 

Over 40 AI-powered Flock cameras in the city track each time a car passes, recording identifying information like bike racks, car color and bumper stickers in addition to license plate numbers. For several years, Boulder’s data was automatically available for warrantless search by thousands of law enforcement agencies across the country via Flock’s national network, including U.S. Border Patrol. In recent months, reports revealed that Flock had also shared data directly with Homeland Security Investigations, the investigations arm of ICE, after claiming it did not share data with federal immigration agencies.

In June, following pushback from local privacy advocates, Boulder removed itself from the national Flock network. It continues to share data on a network of Colorado police departments, at least one of which granted federal agents access to its Flock account this year for ICE-related searches, according to 9News. 

The City of Boulder’s contract will renew without city council consideration in March. A city representative said contracts are considered an administrative function, which places them under the purview of city staff, not elected officials. The move comes as a heated debate in Denver continues between the mayor and city council over whether to continue similar Flock contracts.

Flock cancellations in cities across the country

Flock has faced pushback in localities across the country. In recent weeks, cities in Washington, Texas and North Carolina, among others, have ended Flock contracts over privacy concerns. Last month, police in Redmond, Washington, turned off their Flock cameras after unidentified masked ICE officers arrested seven people, at least three of them less than a mile from one or more of the city’s Flock cameras. 

Some of the earliest local backlash this year came in May, when Denver City Council voted unanimously to end its contract with Flock before Mayor Mike Johnston overrode them by extending the contract just below the $500,000 threshold that would have required council approval, prompting ongoing debate.

Boulder state Sen. Judy Amabile has announced her intention to introduce a bill regulating automatic license plate reader (ALPR) technology like Flock’s to “establish guardrails” on government use.

Any Colorado Flock data shared with ICE could be a violation of a 2025 state law banning state and local governments from sharing personal identifying information for immigration enforcement.

Recently the debate has reached Congress: Oregon U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden accused Flock of intentionally misleading local governments, saying company representatives admitted they told customers they weren’t working with the Department of Homeland Security even while pilot programs with DHS agencies were active. 

“I now believe that abuses of your product are not only likely but inevitable, and that Flock is unable and uninterested in preventing them,” he wrote in a letter to the company.

Criticisms of Flock

Boulder Police say that Flock helps catch criminals. Since its contract began in January 2022, the department reports a 34.5% decline in vehicle thefts compared with the previous five-year average, which the department attributes to the system’s ability to identify stolen vehicles and alert officers in real time. 

The technology has also produced errors elsewhere. In October, the Colorado Sun reported that a Columbine Valley police officer told an innocent woman they had “no doubt” she had stolen her neighbor’s package, based on footage of her vehicle picked up by Flock cameras.

Civil rights groups have also raised privacy concerns. Flock data is searchable without a warrant, and in one case, a Kansas officer used the database to stalk his ex-girlfriend. While advocating to end Denver’s Flock contract, the ACLU of Colorado wrote that “this mass surveillance technology poses a serious threat to the democratic rights of every person in our city.”

Boulder police will also not provide individuals with data collected on their own vehicles. Police representatives said they could not run a search for a Boulder Reporting Lab reporter’s license plate unless it was for a “legitimate law enforcement purpose,” due to language in Boulder’s contract with Flock.

Last month in Washington, police provided similar reasons for denying records requests to journalists and were overruled by a state court, which determined all Flock images were public records. Rachael Johnson, a lawyer who works with the Colorado Freedom of Information Coalition, told Boulder Reporting Lab that an agency cannot use a contract to refuse access to public information.

Boulder weighs in

The Flock cameras have prompted pushback from a group of privacy advocates in Boulder, the most well-known of whom is Boulder resident Will Freeman, who runs DeFlock, a website tracking the location of Flock cameras nationally and advocating to end their use.

Last month, Freeman held his first  “Flock Walk,” during which he demonstrated a new DeFlock app for reporting and navigating around Flock cameras and shared background on how cameras are used by police.

A few city councilmembers have weighed in on DeFlock’s Discord channel but have not mentioned any specific change to city policy regarding Flock cameras.

Councilmember Matt Benjamin wrote the city needed to find “that balance between safety and trust,” and Councilmember Nicole Speer wrote that Boulder needs to safeguard privacy by “strengthening local policies, investing in secure infrastructure, and standing firm in our values.”