Flock Safety, the company already running roadside license plate cameras in more than 6,000 US communities, says its fastest-growing business is now police drones. These aircraft fly at 400 feet, hit 60 mph, and can read license plates from up to 2,000 feet away.

What the drones actually do

CEO Garrett Langley told the All-In podcast that the drones sit in climate-controlled rooftop docks, usually on police precincts or fire departments. When a 911 call comes in, they send a drone before they send an officer.

Flock says its Drone as First Responder system, called DFR, arrives in an average of 86 seconds and can resolve 20% of calls without an officer being sent. A 40x optical zoom lets operators inspect a scene from a distance.

A Flock spokesperson said the firm has more than 200 DFR customers, including police departments and private companies. The company is ramping up production of its US-designed drones, which will be built in Georgia.

The lighter that was not a gun

Langley described a Dallas-Fort Worth call where a woman at a gas station reported a man pacing with what she thought was a gun. The drone got there in under a minute. The object was a lighter. Flock presents that as proof the system can stop a dangerous encounter before it starts.

I’ll give them that one. A cop racing to the wrong call with lights on is a system that can get someone killed. Sending a camera first is not a stupid idea on its face.

Dearborn, Michigan has a similar Skydio system that can reach incidents in around 2.5 minutes. As of February, more than 1,000 public safety agencies had received the FAA waivers needed to automate drone operations.

A flying plate reader with almost no law behind it

The Electronic Frontier Foundation warns that these aircraft can observe people through windows, in backyards, and on roofs without their knowledge. Flock added license plate reading to the drones last year. The Flock Alpha can read plates from up to 2,000 feet away.

That is not a camera bolted to a pole. That is the same surveillance network, now able to follow you off the road and into places a roadside box cannot see.

Flock says DFR only activates for calls for service, that every flight is logged and auditable, and that there is a public-facing transparency dashboard. Langley said most customers publish audit logs and flight patterns, with a delay for active investigations. Then he said this: “There’s very little state regulation. There’s zero federal regulation outside of air safety.”

Zero. Not that they are working on it. Zero, outside of whether the aircraft stays in the air.

This company already has a problem on the ground

Flock’s core cameras have already produced large numbers of false alerts. Officers have allegedly used the systems to stalk partners and ex-girlfriends. Moving those same tools into the sky does not clean that up. It makes the blast radius bigger.

If a cop can abuse a camera on a stick, a cop can abuse a drone with 40x zoom. Regular people have almost no federal rulebook to lean on when they do.

What you should actually do with this

This is spreading because it is sold as safety. Faster response. Fewer cops charging in on a false alarm. That pitch works on town boards. Ask the next question anyway.

• Flock already has cameras in more than 6,000 US communities. Drones are the growth product sitting on top of that network.
• The Flock Alpha can read a plate from 2,000 feet. That is well beyond what you can see from the sidewalk.
• More than 1,000 public safety agencies already have FAA waivers for automated drone flights, as of February.
• There is no federal privacy law covering this. Langley said so himself.
• If your town is talking about first responder drones, ask who owns the footage, how long they keep it, who can search it, and whether flight logs go public without a long delay.
• You can check whether your plate has been searched on Flock’s camera network.

Cameras on the road. Cameras in the air. Almost no oversight. If that does not bother you yet, wait until it is your backyard and your plate.

Primary Source: https://www.techspot.com/news/113541-flock-fastest-growing-business-60-mph-police-drones.html