Senate hearing probes claims of Flock camera Fourth Amendment violations

Witnesses in a Senate subcommittee hearing Wednesday argued that the artificial intelligence-powered Flock camera network violated citizens’ Fourth Amendment rights, citing a woman who was wrongfully jailed for 13 days. 

Lindsay Isaacs testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Crime and Counterterrorism that she spent a total of 13 days behind bars after she was falsely identified as a suspect in a fatal car accident in 2025. A Flock AI-automated camera captured images of her vehicle near the scene, and she was wrongfully arrested, despite both her insistence that she was not involved in the crash and a lack of corroborating damage to her vehicle. She was placed into solitary confinement for more than three days because of the severity of her alleged crime and spent an additional 10 days in prison.

Why do some claim this technology violates the Fourth Amendment? Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., said there are 120,000 Flock cameras in 49 states, with cameras capturing 20 billion images monthly. Pinal County, Ariz., Sheriff Ross Teeple testified that his office ended its agreement with Flock cameras because fighting crime with this technology must not supersede people’s Fourth Amendment right to unreasonable searches and seizures. Teeple said innocent Americans are being surveilled without a warrant or being suspected of committing a crime. If companies like Flock continue logging the habits of innocent Americans, he said, it will lead to an AI-driven surveillance state.

How are the Flock cameras different from traditional license plate readers? Alasdair Whitney is the legislative counsel for the Institute for Justice, a nonprofit public interest law firm. Whitney said the cameras have been in front of medical facilities, churches, and even sensitive areas like a person’s porch. He testified that Flock camera systems are different from traditional license plate readers because government officials can reconstruct months’ worth of a person’s activity or movements, even if they live across the country. Whitney also said that the AI technology allows the government to sift through billions of images with the ease of a Google search. The new AI technology can also search for human images, rather than simply license plates, according to Hawley.

What did the CEO of Flock say? The Flock CEO, Garrett Langley, refused to attend the hearing, but sent a letter in response to Hawley’s invitation. According to Hawley, Flock acknowledged that there is very little oversight of their clients’ searches. The search records, Langley said, are owned and controlled by each customer agency. The letter also confirmed Flock’s ability to search for humans in images.