JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – The Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office is standing behind its use of license plate reader technology, pointing to a growing list of solved crimes and rescued victims as evidence the tools are making Duval County safer — even as the company behind the cameras faces mounting criticism nationwide and moves to overhaul its accountability measures.
Flock cameras are license plate readers that record the license plate numbers and other characteristics of all passing vehicles every day. Thousands of law enforcement agencies in 49 states can search and share Flock’s data across jurisdictions to aid their investigations.
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Solving crimes, saving lives
Over the past two years, JSO says LPRs — license plate readers — have helped investigators solve 15 murders, 17 kidnappings, 6 forcible sex offenses, nearly 100 shootings and 172 missing-persons cases.
JSO says an LPR recently helped locate a teenage girl who had been kidnapped from her home in Georgia and brought to a Jacksonville motel.
In another case, an LPR helped officers quickly find an elderly man with dementia who had gone missing.
The technology also played a role in a high-profile case involving law enforcement. After a JSO corrections officer was killed at a truck stop in October 2024, investigators say they used an LPR to track down the suspects — who were taken into custody within 48 hours.
Scale, oversight of the program
JSO currently operates 141 fixed LPRs and 9 mobile LPRs across Duval County. The agency says the technology is used strictly for legitimate law-enforcement purposes and that the system is both monitored and audited.
“If someone misuses the system, we will address it,” the agency said in a statement.
Officials say the goal is to strike a balance between public safety and public trust.
“Our goal is to use technology responsibly to help keep our community safe while maintaining accountability and trust,” JSO said.
A technology under fire
Flock Safety is facing growing scrutiny from lawmakers on both sides of the aisle, civil liberties advocates and citizens across the country.
Critics argue the pervasiveness of the cameras amounts to unconstitutional warrantless mass surveillance. Concerns have also grown that Flock’s data could be accessed for immigration enforcement or used in unauthorized tracking.
Those concerns are not hypothetical. A flurry of documented examples have surfaced of law enforcement officers misusing the technology for personal searches, fueling calls for tighter restrictions or outright bans.
Flock CEO responds
Dozens of cities and agencies have already cut ties with Flock Safety in response to those concerns.
Amid the growing backlash, Flock Safety CEO Garrett Langley announced a series of changes he says will drive greater accountability across the platform. Many of the changes, he said, will make previously optional safeguards mandatory for all users by Jan. 1.
Among the most significant: All law enforcement customers will now be required to implement an audit tool designed to flag abnormal search behavior. When the system detects abnormal behavior, the user will be locked out pending an internal review.
Flock is also shortening its standard data retention window from 30 days to seven. Data tied to an active case number can still be preserved longer, the company said.
Law enforcement users will also be required to enter a code from their records management system linking each search to a specific case before it is run — a change Langley said civil liberties advocates have long called for. Emergency overrides would be automatically flagged for review.
Customers will also gain the ability to decide which offense types — such as homicide or arson — outside agencies can search their data for, giving departments the option to block outside searches related to immigration enforcement.
Langley said that change will give individual cities and departments control to use the system in a manner “consistent with community values.”