CHARLESTON, W.Va. — While there has been some back and forth between the West Virginia Legislature and Flock Safety, lawmakers still have some questions.
The artificial-intelligence-powered Flock cameras have been a polarizing topic in the Mountain State in recent months. Huntington City Council approved a $2.1 million agreement with Flock to install cameras in the city, but nothing has been signed. The Monongalia County Commission has heard concerns from residents over the Automatic License Plate Readers (ALPRs) that the sheriff’s department uses.
During interim committee meetings in August, lawmakers pressed Flock Director of Government Affairs Kevin Kane for details about what the technology can and can’t do. After that meeting, the state legislature sent a letter to Flock with follow-up questions of concerns that weren’t addressed.
Del. Tristan Leavitt, R-Kanawha, said on MetroNews “Talkline” Monday that Flock sent a response on September 1. He said it included a “fair amount of information” but failed to answer some specific questions. Leavitt said that the legislature sent another letter on September 3, to which Flock responded September 16 suggesting a meeting to “discuss it instead,” in addition to another response last Friday.
Leavitt detailed that Flock’s letter did break down information into the categories that the lawmakers requested, but there are still questions that remain.
“It still did not provide some of the information we requested,” Leavitt said. “Certain things, such as questions about how many employees, they’ve ever had that have improperly accessed customer data, or what non-U.S. vendor they are sending customer images to; they revealed that in one of their letters to us, and some other issues.”
Leavitt said the indication from Flock was that a follow-up meeting would happen off the record in his “office.” However, he said, that turned out to not to be true.
“For us to assume that there’s not really any way that a meeting in my office can be a public proceeding, I think, was fair of us,” Leavitt said. “They continued to put that out in their letters that they would be happy to talk, have discussions. None of those indicated that they wanted to talk publicly.”
Leavitt said now, Flock seems willing to share information during the next batch of interim committee meetings in December. While there has been a “fair amount of information” disclosed so far, Leavitt said lawmakers have questions that they need answered. He noted that it’s within the legislature’s legal authority to compel Flock to answer certain questions, but they won’t take that step unless Flock dodges questions in December.
Kane, the Flock representative who lawmakers got to speak to several months ago, said some interesting things, Leavitt noted.
“He was very, very clear in articulating that he believed, and Flock’s position was, if you will, that it was not sufficient to simply have policies in place that said, ‘it’s not good to access this information.’ You had to have a regular audit,” Leavitt said.
Leavitt said that Flock needs more audits, rather than just policies.
“Flock has made pretty clear that they do not conduct regular audits, they only rely on the technology,” Leavitt said. “Again, that begs the question of whether their own employees have improperly accessed this stuff.”
A case in Dunwoody, Georgia with Flock caught Leavitt’s attention. Leavitt said there have been some reports about Flock employees taking information from Dunwoody without the local authorities’ consent. Leavitt said this case could inform the legislature’s verbiage when potentially drafting policies on how Flock is to operate in West Virginia.
He said there’s a similar question to answer, are people abusing Flock cameras on the corporate side, not just some law enforcement? Several cases across the nation have drawn significant attention for police officers reportedly attempting to stalk their ex-partners through the ALPRs and cameras.
“We could go as far as to create criminal liability for people accessing it in that way,” Leavitt said. “But we would like to start with the information of knowing whether this has been abused so far or whether this is not so much of a concern.”
Leavitt said there are “red flags all over the place” with respect to potential government misuse of the data, and how it could sidestep a warrant. He added that if the government accesses it, the Fourth Amendment comes into apply. As if companies search their own data, is it a violation? Leavitt said it’s not entirely clear what Flock’s policy is on that just yet.
“We have this unusual situation where a private company has all this data, and in some ways it’s like the ‘Big Tech’ debate,” Leavitt said. “Meta; Facebook and Instagram, we give so much data to various companies. In this instance, it’s not just that the big company has so much data. It’s that government is using that company and that data.”