Dem
51
Ties
4
GOP
45
Flock Safety is a private company that has manufactured and installed 120,000 AI-driven cameras on roads all over the country in 49 states. The cameras record not only the license plates of cars they detect, but also the make, model and color of the car, and other features including bumper stickers. Flock's AI software analyzes the images and uses the data to maintain a database of who was where when. Its business model is selling the data to over 5,000 law enforcement agencies. Although its cameras do record people, Flock claims that its customers cannot do searches based on race. However, there is no way for any independent party to verify that claim.
Many Americans find this technology an invasion of their privacy. An Ipsos poll in early September found that Americans do not want them by a margin of 47% to 38%. Young people (18-34) hate them, but seniors like them. Democrats and independents strongly oppose them but more Republicans like them (54%) than dislike them (37%), with the latter group probably containing many libertarians. Men dislike the cameras more than women. The general dislike of the cameras cuts across education levels.
After news stories came out reporting that police officers were using the Flock cameras to track the movements of their romantic partners, ex-girlfriends, and stalk other women, there was a huge backlash to the cameras. If you think this was big news, just wait until some government law-enforcement agency asks for and gets a list of all Americans with a "Resist Trump" bumper sticker with the list containing the name and address of the car's registered owner, nicely sorted by ZIP code. Even Big Brother could not envision such an invasive technology that kept track of the whereabouts of tens of millions of people whenever they get in their cars.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) don't like the Flock cameras either and have decided to do something about them. Together they have written a bill, called the Ban Flock Act, they will introduce into the Senate and House; the bill would ban the cameras altogether and stop the flow of federal funds to governments that use them.
When asked about the bill, Sanders said: "At a time of growing concern about the unchecked power of artificial intelligence, Flock is eviscerating the very notion of privacy by installing tens of thousands of cameras in communities across America without their consent. We cannot allow America to become a surveillance state where a handful of AI oligarchs profit by giving the government the power to track our every movement." This puts Sanders and AOC on the right side of public opinion. To the extent that the two are leading the anti-AI, anti-Flock movement, it makes it much more difficult for the Republicans to turn them into a boogeyman and boogeywoman, respectively. Also, when the Republicans call them socialists, some people are surely going to think: "Gee, if socialists hate Flock cameras, I'm with them on that." (V)