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What started as a Super Bowl ad about finding lost dogs ended in a multicity contract termination for Flock, not because its technology was featured in the ad, but because of growing public sentiment as a result.<\/p>\n
In a controversial yet viral ad for Amazon\u2019s Ring that premiered during the Super Bowl, a user uploaded a photo of a lost dog so participating homes in Ring\u2019s Search Party feature can scan their footage to find that lost dog. What started as a heartwarming story of reunification culminated in millions of Americans shocked at how \u201ccreepy\u201d the tech was, and how it could be manipulated into nefarious purposes, such as tracking individuals and finding their current whereabouts.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The ad portrayed Ring\u2019s Search Party feature, notably different than the Community Requests feature Ring and Flock had initially partnered on to integrate technologies. Ring terminated its contract with Flock Safety, an AI-powered license reader used by (or, formerly for some) police precincts across the country. Flock, a company that sells networks of roadside cameras and software to police departments, businesses, and neighborhoods to identify vehicles and feed that data into searchable law-enforcement databases, is active in more than 5,000 U.S. cities. The software scans license plates and uses integrated video tools to log plates, time, and location, then alerts police when a vehicle matches a \u201chot list\u201d or is linked to an investigation.<\/p>\n
But Ring\u2019s Super Bowl commercial, regardless of the fact it featured Ring technology and not Flock\u2019s, made millions wary of the software company\u2019s large camera and data network, and how it could be easily repurposed to not only scan license plates but something more.<\/p>\n
\u201cFlock\u2019s intended integration with Community Requests has been cancelled,\u201d a Ring spokesperson told Fortune.<\/em> \u201cThis integration was never live, and no videos were ever shared between these services. Following a comprehensive review, we determined the planned Flock Safety integration would require significantly more time and resources than anticipated. We therefore made the joint decision to cancel the integration.\u201d<\/p>\n This move occurred amid escalating concerns regarding privacy, civil liberties, and the role of private tech companies in federal law enforcement activities.<\/p>\n A spokesperson for Flock told Fortune:<\/em> \u201cWe didn\u2019t know the Super Bowl ad was coming, and we didn\u2019t have anything to do with it.\u201d<\/p>\n Instead, Flock and Ring agreed the integration to improve Community Requests would prove difficult with current resources, the Flock spokesperson added.<\/p>\n Now cities are similarly following suit and cancelling their own contracts with the software company. Cities from Flagstaff, Ariz., to Windsor, Conn., have joined more than 30 other cities across the country that have either suspended, if not fully terminated, their partnership with Flock.<\/p>\n Since the beginning of 2025, at least 30 cities have canceled their contracts with Flock, including Eugene, Ore.; Hillsborough, N.C.; and Santa Cruz, Calif. Flagstaff Mayor Becky Daggett told NPR \u201ccommunity outrage\u201d made it clear the technology would not be received well, even as she had high hopes to use the technology.<\/p>\n \u201cIn the end, it was just clear that this wasn\u2019t going to be a technology that was going to be well received or that we could continue to use,\u201d Daggett told NPR.<\/p>\n \u201cI think that the mayor said it almost better than I could say it myself,\u201d the Flock spokesperson told Fortune. <\/em>\u201cCommunities that are removing Flock are just doing themselves a disservice, without addressing the underlying concerns that are actually at issue,\u201d the spokesperson added, saying the company has put guardrails in place to work with communities to address any privacy concerns they might have.<\/p>\n \u201cFlock is able to configure our system so that it can align with any community or any state\u2019s local laws and local values,\u201d the spokesperson said, referencing the company\u2019s work in San Francisco and Oakland, Calif., in which the two cities have regulation preventing license-plate readers from working with immigration enforcement\u2014something with which Flock was already aligned. \u201cWe\u2019ve actually hard-coded guardrails that prevent that. So we have a filter that would block any immigration related searches that is automatically applied across California.\u201d<\/p>\n Other cities echo the sentiment. \u201cOver the past several years, the Windsor Police Department has had a cooperative relationship with Flock Safety,\u201d an assistant to the town manager of Windsor, Conn., told Fortune.<\/em> \u201cThe department has utilized the technology as one of many tools intended to assist in investigations and locate stolen vehicles and missing persons. While the cameras have contributed valuable investigative information, they have always represented just one component of our overall public safety strategy.\u201d<\/p>\n Even major metropolitan departments have begun to push back on Flock\u2019s standard terms. The Boston Police Department and the Massachusetts ACLU demanded changes to their user agreement to ensure they could restrict data sharing, bypassing Flock\u2019s default clause, which grants the company a \u201cworldwide, perpetual, royalty-free\u201d license to disclose agency data for \u201cinvestigative purposes.\u201d<\/p>\n Jamie Siminoff, the founder of Ring who recently returned as CEO to re-embrace the company\u2019s original mission of \u201cfighting crime,\u201d expressed deep disappointment about the public\u2019s reaction. In a series of reflections on the feature\u2019s launch, Siminoff defended the tool\u2019s utility and its privacy protections.<\/p>\n Later, addressing the viral criticism, he remarked: \u201cIt was a shame,\u201d Siminoff told Fortune. <\/em>\u201cThe misunderstanding of it is what makes me sad, because it\u2019s like people sort of made their own narrative of how it works.\u201d He emphasized the system is entirely voluntary, explaining if a neighbor chooses not to share footage, \u201cyour privacy is totally fine, no one knows.\u201d Siminoff maintained the digital system was simply a more efficient version of calling a phone number on a dog\u2019s tag, adding, \u201cI do think it\u2019s a very good-for-the-world thing.\u201d<\/p>\n Announced in October 2025, the Flock-Ring deal was intended to integrate Ring\u2019s Community Requests feature with Flock\u2019s software, allowing police to more easily request and receive footage from private homes.<\/p>\n The partnership drew scrutiny because of Flock\u2019s reported ties to federal agencies. But the Flock spokesperson dismissed these ties as rumors, saying: \u201cWe do not have any contracts with any of them, which means they cannot directly access data on the platform.\u201d<\/p>\n The public outcry has been growing. The open-source app DeFlock.org recently launched to track the location of more than 77,000 AI license-plate readers across the country, with the app\u2019s creators arguing the scanners have create a detailed \u201clocation history\u201d of ordinary residents, leading to racial profiling and potential stalking by officers. The Flock spokesperson said the technology just shows a license plate at one location at a single point and place in time.<\/p>\n The company is working to implement more guardrails to address any community concerns, adding: \u201cWe are ready to work with any of those cities again, should they choose.\u201d<\/p>\n While the contract terminated, Ring said the public sentiment does prove one thing: People want to feel safe in their neighborhoods.<\/p>\n \u201cSo while the controversy was sort of high in the social media area,\u201d Siminoff told Fortune, <\/em>\u201cI\u2019m not sure how much of a percentage of that actually translated into like, population.<\/p>\n \u201cI think a lot of people actually are pretty psyched about safer neighborhoods and returning dogs with a company like Ring maintaining your privacy.\u201d<\/p>\n This article has been updated to include comments from Ring and the Town of Windsor.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n #Cities #join #Amazon #contracts #license #scanner #Ring #Super #Bowl<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" What started as a Super Bowl a… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":26420,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[374,11628,5343,1503,2515,15014,2342,15015,1815,1803],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26419"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=26419"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26419\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/26420"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=26419"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=26419"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=26419"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}The de-flocking continues<\/h2>\n