A bipartisan pair of US lawmakers tell WIRED they plan to introduce legislation today that would strip federal funding from states that fail to restrict the use of Flock cameras and other automated license plate readers. The devices, which help police track the location of vehicles tied to crimes, have become the subject of nationwide backlash in recent months over more nefarious uses by officers.

The No FLOCK Act—for Federal License-Plate Observation and Camera Keeping—directs the US secretary of transportation to withhold 10 percent of annual financial support due to states for highways, roads, and bridges if it fails to ban Flock and similar devices for all but five use cases. Congressmen Raja Krishnamoorthi, a Democrat representing Chicago suburbs, and Michael Cloud, a Republican whose Texas district includes Corpus Christi, are cosponsoring the bill.

The legislation says that Flock cameras could be used only for “enforcing toll systems, identifying stolen vehicles, missing or endangered persons, vehicles registered to persons with a warrant for a felony offense, or investigating a vehicle involved in a felony offense.” Notably absent are uses like conducting traffic studies, investigating minor drug crimes, and enforcing parking and speeding rules.

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The Boston city government abandoned Flock Safety's license-plate reader cameras after the company shared data nationwide in violation of a contract provision, according to city officials.

"We have actually abandoned Flock," Boston Mayor Michelle Wu said in her monthly "Ask the Mayor" segment on GBH News last week. Wu made the comment a few days before the release of Boston's annual surveillance technology report, which said a Flock "vendor error" resulted in nationwide data sharing.

The report, which covers 2025, describes how the Boston Police Department deployed about 45 Automated License Plate Reader (ALPR) cameras in a trial with Flock from April to September last year. The unauthorized data sharing occurred during the first few days of the pilot, the report said:

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New data compiled by a Bay Area anti-surveillance advocacy group shows that not only are American localities dropping cameras from Flock Safety, but they are doing it at an accelerating rate.

Communities from Lansing, Michigan, to Pflugerville, Texas, are ending their relationship with Flock, largely over concerns regarding out-of-control surveillance, unwanted data sharing, high expenses, and reports of police abusing the tool.

Secure Justice, an Oakland-based advocacy group, has recorded 214 cities and counties that have dropped Flock since 2021. Of those, 90 ended their relationship with Flock in August 2026 alone, a fourfold increase compared to the previous month.

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