LAPD lets its Flock surveillance camera contract expire over civil liberties concerns

The Los Angeles Police Department allowed its contract with surveillance company Flock Safety to expire on July 13, 2026, ending a three-year relationship that gave the department access to Flock's network of automated license plate reader cameras, according to a report from TechCrunch. LAPD's chief information officer, Dean Gialamas, said the department has "serious concerns around civil liberties and civil rights issues, particularly around privacy and the data that is being collected from these cameras."

What went wrong with the Flock relationship

LAPD's decision follows a string of documented problems with license plate reader technology broadly and Flock's system specifically. Multiple cases have surfaced of motorists being detained at gunpoint or jailed due to false-positive matches generated by license plate readers. Separately, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration reportedly used a local officer's login credentials without consent to conduct immigration-related surveillance through the system, and federal immigration officials have allegedly used Flock cameras to track individuals in ways that violated local sanctuary city laws.

Security gaps compounded the privacy concerns: some exposed camera feeds allowed public access to live video, and many law enforcement logins to the Flock system reportedly lacked multi-factor authentication.

Not a full ban — a negotiating position

LAPD has not ruled out renewing its relationship with Flock. Gialamas indicated the department wants improved contractual language covering data storage, privacy protections, and security protocols before any potential renewal — framing the lapse as leverage in an ongoing negotiation rather than a permanent policy shift away from license plate reader technology altogether.

Part of a broader pattern

LAPD is the nation's third-largest police department and one of Flock's most significant government customers, making its decision to let the contract lapse a meaningful signal in the surveillance technology market. Flock operates an estimated 80,000 cameras across the United States. LAPD joins a growing list of municipalities — including Mountain View, California, and South Portland, Maine — that have already terminated Flock contracts over similar civil liberties and data-sharing concerns.

The decision arrives amid intensifying national scrutiny of how automated surveillance networks share data across jurisdictional and agency lines, particularly regarding federal agencies accessing local police data for purposes — like immigration enforcement — that fall outside what local governments authorized when they signed on.