Senator Bernie Sanders has introduced the Ban Flock Act, a bill that would bar federal agencies from using automatic license plate readers (ALPRs) or tapping into data collected by local police and private companies. Despite the name, the legislation covers all ALPR systems, not just Flock Safety, the largest vendor in the U.S.
The bill includes financial teeth: state and local governments that fail to ban the technology would lose grants from five federal departments, including Justice and Homeland Security, starting the first fiscal year after enactment. It also lets individuals sue the federal government over violations and gives state attorneys general enforcement power. Exceptions are limited to toll collection and future congressional approvals that cap data retention at 48 hours.
Flock, valued by investors at more than $8 billion, operates over 120,000 cameras and processes more than 20 billion vehicle reads per month, according to Sanders. The company has already tightened its rules under community pressure, cutting default data retention from 30 days to seven and adding an audit tool that flags unusual searches. The bill faces long odds, but it signals growing political risk for a business model that has drawn protests and contract cancellations.