Officials say the device will identify “dangerous activities” including protesting police, supporting Palestine, filing public-records requests, and attempting to determine why there is a Flock camera in your living room.
You will receive a Flock Safety camera in your living room beginning this fall under a citywide public-safety initiative approved Tuesday. Your device will be mounted above the television and scan for what officials call “behavioral indicators associated with elevated civic risk.” You do not need to be home for installation.
According to city materials, indicators may include covering the camera, closing your blinds during daylight hours, possessing multiple protest signs, expressing support for Palestine, attending demonstrations critical of police, objecting to license-plate readers, filing repeated public-records requests, or asking who is authorized to search your footage.
You will not be considered a suspect merely because the system flags you. Instead, your household will receive a “contextual risk designation” visible to police, regional agencies, and approved public-safety partners. Officials emphasized that the designation is not punitive and may be removed after 180 days of “normalized activity.”
Your camera will not record audio. It will, however, identify faces, clothing, carried objects, visitors, printed materials, window signage, and “repeated patterns of concealment.” Officials said this should address most privacy concerns. If you rent, your landlord may consent on your behalf. If you own your home, participation is mandatory under the city’s expanded definition of the public right-of-way, which now includes “private residential space capable of generating downstream public-safety effects.”
Council members said the program closes a gap in the camera network. “Right now, when you go inside, we lose visibility,” one member explained. “That’s fourteen, sometimes sixteen hours where we simply don’t know what you’re doing.”
You may request your footage through city portal. Material involving active investigations, proprietary analytics, neighboring jurisdictions, or footage needed to determine why you were flagged may be withheld. You are asked not to obstruct the camera with furniture, houseplants, flags, curtains, tape, clothing, or your body. Repeated attempts to do so may be interpreted as an indicator of anti-surveillance activity and may result in prison time.
I filed a public-records request for the vendor contract. The response says the contract is withheld because releasing it could reveal the indicators. I've now filed a request about that response, which I understand is itself one of the indicators.
Appeal the denial. In most states the exemption for investigative techniques doesn't cover the contract price, and they have to release the parts that aren't exempt. Ask for the invoice separately, they usually forget to withhold invoices.
Civil liberties lawyer. An "expanded definition of the public right-of-way" that includes the inside of your house is going to produce the most interesting brief I ever write. The council has more or less written our motion for us.
My landlord consented on my behalf and added a $35 monthly "security fee" to the renewal. I asked whether I could at least pick where it's mounted and was told placement is set by the vendor's coverage model.
I reported the camera blinking at night through the tenant portal and the maintenance request was marked resolved the same day.
Are curtains allowed? The FAQ says "curtains are not prohibited" and then lists "repeated patterns of concealment" as an indicator, and I can't figure out where one becomes the other.
Does a bookshelf count as obstruction if it was there before the camera?
Same question but with a cat. Mine sleeps on top of the TV and I'm not moving her.
if you have nothing to hide you have nothing to worry about