This Is Flock’s AI Search Tool for Cops
WIRED reconstructs Flock Safety's AI-powered police surveillance search interface, exposing how AI person-description search and moderation work in law enforcement cameras.
WIRED reverse-engineered Flock Safety's latest AI search tools given to police, including an AI-powered watch list that continuously searches camera footage for people matching written descriptions. The code analysis reveals moderation guardrails that can flag but not block certain searches, including on political, social, and cultural expression. Flock has faced backlash from cities, Congress, and state law over police misuse of its camera network.
- AI watch-list feature lets officers run continuous camera searches for written person descriptions
- Moderation flags but does not block searches; accuracy metrics unavailable outside Flock
- Flock recently shortened data retention and added automated auditing amid backlash
- FreeForm plain-language person search has been sold for years per the company
- Vendors
- Flock SafetyWIRED
- Products
- Flock FreeFormSmart Sort
- Victims
- US police departments
- Organizations
- Center for Democracy and TechnologyFlock Safety
- Countries
- United States
From the original article
12 min read at wired.com
WIRED rebuilt Flock’s latest search tool from code the company sends to a police officer’s browser. Its AI can keep watch across multiple cameras for anyone fitting a written description.
By Dell Cameron, Dhruv Mehrotra · wired.com
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