Call to Action: Protect Ventura’s Privacy – Demand the Cancellation of Flock Surveillance Cameras

To all local organizations, community leaders, and concerned residents of Ventura: We need your immediate help to protect our civil liberties and privacy from unaccountable mass surveillance.

To be entirely clear, this is not an attack on or a lack of trust in the Ventura Police Department. Rather, this is about a systemic lack of trust in a private, venture-backed surveillance corporation and the unconstitutional access avenues it provides to the federal government and out-of-state entities. Our public safety should not be outsourced to insecure, third-party code.

The City of Ventura currently deploys 23 Flock Safety automated mass-surveillance cameras across our community. Flock Safety has proven to be an insecure, deceptive, and fundamentally bad partner, and these cameras pose a persistent threat to our constitutional rights.

Originally approved quietly on a 2020 consent calendar (Item 8E) as a small, temporary 6-camera trial, this system has experienced massive “surveillance creep” with a nearly 4x increase in deployment, absent of robust public debate.

Why We Must Act Now: The Case Against Flock Safety

Recent exposes and audits have revealed a disturbing pattern of privacy violations, security flaws, and corporate deception:

Severe Data Breaches: Regional data security failures earlier this year proved that out-of-state and federal agencies successfully bypassed California protections to query local data hundreds of thousands of times. This breach was so severe that the Oxnard Police Department completely suspended their contract.
Unregulated Federal “Backdoor” Channels: Investigations by the University of Washington and the ACLU found that federal immigration authorities (ICE, DHS, CBP) exploit the platform to bypass local police firewalls, contradicting the company’s direct assurances to city councils.
Invasive AI Tracking (People, Not Just Cars): A landmark expose by 404 Media revealed police are using Flock’s “FreeForm” AI to run natural-language searches for
physical human characteristics, clothing, and descriptors—making it a tool for tracking individuals, not just license plates.
Critical Cybersecurity Flaws: Independent security researchers have documented Flock units operating on outdated, unpatched operating systems, leaving images unencrypted and even broadcasting raw, unauthenticated video streams over the open internet.
Our Core Demands to the Ventura City Council
We must pivot away from outsourcing public safety to insecure, third-parties. We are asking all community members to demand the following structured approach from the City Council:
Cancel the Flock Cameras Immediately: Terminate the existing Flock Safety contract and dismantle the apparatus. Our constitutional rights are too important to risk on an unreliable vendor.
Gather Actionable Statistics: Compile localized statistics strictly on missing persons and stolen vehicles to define the actual scope of the problem including how often surveillance cameras were effective.
Bring the Discussion to the People: Future mass surveillance technology must never be passed quietly on a consent calendar. We demand robust, transparent public debate on any prospective surveillance tools.
Consider Different Options Only After Oversight: Only once these statistics are vetted and the public has weighed in should the city consider evaluating different camera systems, though we maintain strong opposition to mass surveillance on our streets.

Maybe not as limited to “outside” surveillance as we thought!

On September 30, 2025, a Flock vice president allegedly logged into the Dunwoody Police Department’s Flock system and looked at a camera in the kids’ gymnastics room of a private community center. It was that easy.

The community center had shared its cameras with the police department ‘solely for real-time critical incident response.’ Instead, Flock and local officials claim it was used in a ‘sales demo,’ saying it was authorized under the city’s ‘demo partner agreement.’ The problem? There’s no proof that the agreement even exists.

Now, residents are wondering what kind of sales demo would require looking at one camera in a children’s gymnastics room, and why a police department would have third-party camera integration in a gymnastics room for kids. And incidents like this aren’t a one-off.

Reporting shows Flock surveillance data being accessed in ways cities didn’t approve, including by the federal government and other states. Law enforcement officers have also misused the system to do things like stalk exes or partners. It’s a system ripe for abuse, enabling mass tracking with little oversight. That’s why cities are cancelling their contracts with Flock all across the country, and residents keep destroying the cameras.

Take Action Today

Please email the Ventura City Council immediately to demand the termination of the Flock contract. You can copy the provided email addresses below and use the template message provided.

Official / Title	Email Address
Jeannette Sanchez-Palacios, Mayor	jpalacios@cityofventura.ca.gov
Douglas Halter, Councilmember	dhalter@cityofventura.ca.gov
Liz Campos, Councilmember	lcampos@cityofventura.ca.gov
Jim Duran, Councilmember	jim.duran@cityofventura.ca.gov
Alex Mangone, Councilmember	amangone@cityofventura.ca.gov
R. Schumacher, Councilmember	rschumacher@cityofventura.ca.gov
B. McReynolds, Councilmember	bmcreynolds@cityofventura.ca.gov
Ventura City Clerk	cityclerk@cityofventura.ca.gov

ACTION: Email Template for Residents

Copy and paste the text below into your email client. Feel free to personalize it with your own neighborhood or additional thoughts.

Subject: Terminate the Flock Safety Contract Immediately

Dear Mayor and Members of the Ventura City Council,

I am writing to you today as a local resident to strongly urge the immediate cancellation of the City’s contract with Flock Safety and the removal of all 23 automated surveillance cameras from our streets.

To be entirely clear: this is not an attack on or a lack of trust in the Ventura Police Department. Rather, this is about a systemic lack of trust in a private, venture-backed surveillance corporation and the unconstitutional access avenues it provides to the federal government and out-of-state entities. Our public safety should not be outsourced to insecure, third-party code.

Flock has proven itself to be an insecure and wholly untrustworthy partner. From catastrophic data breaches allowing unauthorized out-of-state and federal access, to fundamental cybersecurity flaws and unapproved AI tracking of human visual descriptors, this company has repeatedly violated public trust.

I am asking the Council to commit to a more responsible path forward:
1. Cancel the Flock cameras immediately.
2. Gather accurate statistics on missing persons and stolen vehicles, and have this data include surveillance camera effectiveness.
3. Bring all discussions regarding public surveillance to the people—these items must never again be hidden on a consent calendar.
4. Only after these steps are complete should the city consider evaluating different camera systems, though I strongly believe we must move away from mass surveillance entirely.

Major jurisdictions, including our neighbors in Los Angeles, have already walked away from this vendor. Please protect our community’s privacy, data, and civil liberties, and end this contract now.

Sincerely,

[Your Name]
[Your Address/Neighborhood]

WATCH: Get ready to make a comment to our city councilmembers

More Resources!

(EFF) EFF’s Investigations Expose Flock Safety’s Surveillance Abuses: 2025 in Review
(EFF) Street Level Surveillance
(cnet.com) Use This Searchable Database to Locate Flock Surveillance Cameras Near You
(Atlas of Surveillance) Documenting Police Tech in Our Communities with Open Source Research
(Military.com) Don’t Like Car License Plate Readers Invading Your Privacy? It’s About To Get A Lot Worse – Leonardo’s SignalTrace links license plate data with RFID, Bluetooth, and device identifiers to build a trackable electronic fingerprint. “According to the product sheet, SignalTrace “bridges license plate recognition data with sensor-captured device identifiers – such as those from mobile phones, Bluetooth wearables, and vehicle systems – to create a unique, trackable ‘electronic fingerprintʼ for investigative use.”
(ALCU) Get The Flock Out Toolkit
(ACLU) Fight Creepy ALPR Cameras
(ACLU) Automatic License Plate Reader Privacy Model Bill
(ACLU) Local Automatic License Plate Reader Privacy Model Bill
(LATimes) LAPD suspends use of Flock surveillance cameras over privacy issues
(Oxnard) NEWS RELEASE – Oxnard Police Department Suspends Use of Flock Safety Automated License Plate Readers (02/27/26)
(Reddit) Request Ventura City Council to Terminate Flock Safety Contract and Protect Resident Privacy
(ACLU) Tracking ALPR Cameras
(fightforthefuture.org) Flock Out
(Deflock) “popular crowdsourced app for reporting Flock camera locations, has an open-source design that leaves it vulnerable to false reports from people who only think they’re seeing a surveillance device. Self-reports are also becoming less reliable as surveillance cameras are being hidden in speed signs and cacti.
(https://maps.deflock.org) Nationwide
(https://maps.deflock.org/?lat=34.2743&lng=-119.2643&zoom=13.17) Ventura
(Forbes) Flock CEO Apologizes For Calling Activists ‘Terrorists’
(City of Ventura) Ventura PD finds vendor configuration error; immediately changes department procedures
(leginfo) SB 34: Automated license plate recognition systems: use of data. (Chaptered 10/6/2015)
(Calmatters) SB 34: Automated license plate recognition systems: use of data.
(SB 274) Automated license plate recognition systems
(Reddit – r/FlockSurveillance) Axon is a bigger problem than flock.
(Buen Vecino) Join us to learn more about ALPRs and how you can take action with us in the Central Coast!

Democracy Now!: https://youtu.be/oaro56lbLyQ?si=SCQxY0ZtcLt91jlj

Watch Instagram video here: https://www.instagram.com/reels/DbimKU0ticX/

youtube video: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/5aBqgdonnXs

Watch: https://www.reddit.com/r/fuck_ai_slop/comments/1v9ysrt/arizona_man_presents_plan_to_surveil_government/

On July 20, Jacob Petrosky stood in front of the Casa Grande, Arizona City Council during a public comment session and made an announcement.

“I’ve spent the last several months talking to people all over Casa Grande, and one thing keeps coming up: Safety. So, today I’m excited to announce a new company called Shepherd Safety,” he said. “Our mission is simple. Keep government officials and their families safe.” It would be no different than how the city monitors its citizens using Flock cameras, he said; he planned to launch satellites that would use AI to monitor “where government officials go, where they stop, who they meet with, and when they return home.”

He said he’d already started compiling profiles on their vehicles, spouses vehicles, children’s vehicles, and planned to combine that data with Bluetooth signals, advertising IDs, and commercial data sources, “so our authorized users can replay the movements of every government official and their immediate family,” he said. Local businesses would be invited to join the network, to “protect” officials while they shop, eat at restaurants, and move around the city.

After laying out his plan and its benefits for the government officials before him, Petrosky revealed that it was all satire. “I would never do this to you,” he said to the council members. “Could I? Probably. But I wouldn’t because it’s wrong. Just like what you guys are doing to us is wrong.”

Petrosky told me he never expected or intended to be the face of opposition to Flock cameras in his small town. And the clip, which has since gone viral on social media, only shows one angle of one moment that’s part of a much longer fight.

Casa Grande City Council unanimously approved a 10 year, $10 million contract with Flock last year, and since then, Petrosky has spoken against the partnership several times at city council meetings. “You know, I’m actually a little bit embarrassed by the video. I did not feel good about it,” he told me. “The looks… You don’t get to see the looks on [council members’] faces. They didn’t understand it was satire in the beginning until the end, and the looks on their faces were like, we hate you and we’re gonna get you. They were not happy, they were very upset.”