Flock Off: Actions

Since Mass 50501 announced that we are working on removing Flock and other AI-powered LPR and security cameras from our communities, we’ve gotten a lot of questions from people who want to know what they can do. There are a bunch of ways to help get these cameras out of our communities (or at least limit what data they can save and share, if you’re not able to boot them out completely)!

Mass 50501’s Flock Off campaign focuses on putting guardrails in place before towns sign Flock contracts by talking directly with the police departments who sign the contracts or by ensuring that there’s town-level legislation in place to limit how these contracts can be signed.

Flock and companies like it also market to and are expanding into all facets of daily life:

• National chain stores (Home Depot, Lowe’s, Ring Camera, etc.)

• Local businesses

• Faith centers

• K-12 schools (via Raptor Technologies)

• Universities

• Shopping centers, etc.

A robustly protected community will ensure privacy in all of these areas, too.

Here’s what we can share so far:

Local Changes

You can work to change things at the town level:

• Get an ordinance passed! The way you’d go about this depends on your municipality’s governance structure: if you’re in a town, you’ll want to bring this to town meeting. If you’re in a city, you’ll need to talk to your city council. Find out more about how local government works at this link, and check out your town or city’s page!

• If you’re in a town: The deadline to get a question onto your Spring Meeting warrant is probably coming up! Many towns close their warrants in February. Make it a priority to talk to your town clerk about how to get a question on the warrant. It will probably be a petition, which you’ll need some number of residents of the town to sign—some towns require as few as 10 signatures to bring a question to town meeting.

• If you miss your Spring Town Meeting, don’t panic! Most towns also run a Fall Town Meeting, so you can get your question on the warrant then.

Credit Massachusetts Municipal Association

State-level Changes

We can also push for change at the state level. House Bill H.3755, which is active in the State House, would increase driver protections against being surveilled by these AI-enabled security companies. You can support this law (and other laws like it) in a few ways:

• Call or write to your state Senator and Representative; you can find your legislators here.

• Use these letter templates, or write your own.

• Raise awareness in your network—call on your friends and family to call their legislators too.

Changes at Businesses

While Mass 50501 as an organization is currently focusing our efforts to stop Flock use by town governments, members of the community can take steps against businesses that are partnering with Flock, too. While there is not yet a database on businesses who are using Flock, here’s a map of where their cameras are located, and here are updates on Flock usage by municipality. You can use this information to help determine if any local business in your area are working with Flock. Once identified…

• You can try talking to the manager directly, as a customer and a member of the community. Maybe they’ll take the concerns of the community seriously and you can work together to find a less invasive security solution that works for the business without compromising the safety and privacy of the community!

• No dice with a friendly conversation? Raise the stakes! Organize with other patrons and community members to magnify your voice; if they still don’t hear you, you can try to organize a boycott of the establishment until their practices change.

• If you do decide to take on some of the businesses using Flock and other companies with similar business models in your area, let us know how it goes! Write in to flockoff@mass50501.org to share what you’ve tried and if it worked—we’re always looking for innovative ways to take on this problem!

At Mass 50501, we’re working on written resources to help you achieve some of these objectives. We also urge you to get the word out in your community. No matter which avenue of change you end up targeting, we’re always louder when we speak together. To help get the message in front of more eyeballs, we’ve made some Flock Off specific merch available in our store and we have flyers available to post under the cameras in your community.

Want to get more involved at the ground level and help us target our efforts and organize our resistance? Join us on Discord!

• Ask your town or city to cancel their contract! Send an email or letter to your local town government officials; you can find their contact info on your local government website. Most Flock contracts are with the municipality’s police department, so it might make sense to start there, but you can also contact your town’s executive authority—typically the mayor or city planner in a city, or the Select Board in a town. 

  • Indivisible Mass Coalition recently came out with a guide to contacting your town officials.

  • If your town won’t cancel their contracts outright, the ACLU has a helpful guide of ways your town can change their contract language to mitigate the worst effects of these surveillance systems.