Boston cuts ties with Flock Safety over alleged nationwide data sharing
Boston has dropped license-plate camera vendor Flock Safety, saying the company shared city data nationwide in breach of its contract. The city will keep using similar cameras but plans to switch providers.
The City of Boston has ended its contract with Flock Safety, a provider of automatic license-plate reader (ALPR) camera systems, after concluding the company shared the city's data with agencies across the country in violation of their agreement.
According to Boston's annual report on the technology, the city requires vendors to agree not to share license-plate-reader data with outside parties and to delete recordings after 30 days unless police request retention for legal or investigative reasons.
Mayor Michelle Wu said the city isn't abandoning license-plate camera technology altogether. The police department has been piloting different versions of the tool to better track where vehicles are traveling. But Wu stressed that any platform used must guarantee clear knowledge of who can access the data, how it's retained, and for how long. If access controls can't be restricted according to the city's approved policy — or if settings meant to enforce that policy can later be changed or reset — the city will not use that platform.
Wu said any deployment of the technology needs to rest on a publicly approved and authorized policy that protects privacy and civil liberties before it can be used to help solve crimes more quickly.
Wider context
An analysis by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) of search logs from Flock Safety systems found officers around the country running searches in the ALPR database while citing nonsensical justifications, including abbreviations like "LOL" and "idk." The EFF said that while Flock added a dropdown list requiring officers to select a crime-related reason for each search starting in late 2025, the system still does not verify that the stated reason actually matches the true purpose of the search.
Boston is one of a growing number of cities cutting ties with Flock amid concerns over unchecked surveillance, unwanted data sharing, high costs, and reports of police misusing the tool. Flock has said that so far in 2026, new city partnerships have outpaced contract nonrenewals by roughly ten to one.
