We, the people of Coralville and the greater Iowa City Metro Area, respectfully demand from our governments —
Stop Flocking Us
No place to hide
Unbeknown to most Iowa residents, our public roads are rapidly being turned into an unprecedented, for-profit surveillance network. In fact, this is happening all around the country, and Iowa is somewhat late to the party—but we're catching up quickly.
Flock Safety—the surveillance company that is literally blanketing the country, and our state, with its unregulated "vehicle-fingerprinting" cameras—is doing so under the promise of increased public safety, based on claims and statistics that have repeatedly been found to be exaggerated or outright fabricated.1
It's an age-old story of exploiting public fear for profit, but with a truly dystopian twist: the company's CEO, Garrett Langley, apparently envisions a future America "where crime no longer exists"—and believes the way to achieve that future is through a 24/7, total-surveillance society:
Flock's homepage messaging
Never mind the simplistic notion that crime can be “solved” by placing our everyday lives under a microscope, rather than addressing its root causes.
But to blatantly call for what, in most Americans’ minds, is still a dystopian vision—one associated with some of the world’s most brutal authoritarian regimes—is something we simply haven’t seen before.2
Nevertheless, Flock’s formidable marketing machine—powered by hundreds of millions in revenue and venture capital—ensures that one police department after another falls for the pitch, allowing the company's mass-surveillance network to spread across the country like poison ivy.
We should all be able to drive to a doctor’s office, a place of worship, or a political rally without being tracked and cataloged by the police. Is that really such a radical idea?
The loss of liberty is still mostly hypothetical, though, right?
Not really.
Flock’s cameras don’t just capture license plates. They identify vehicles using a “vehicle fingerprint”—recording location, time, travel patterns, and more. This data is stored and shared without a warrant, often across jurisdictions, and with virtually no oversight. And despite company claims to the contrary, it is regularly used in ways that violate both public trust and Flock’s own stated policies.
Here are just a few examples:
— The feds' hidden immigration weapon: Virginia's surveillance network
— ICE Taps into Nationwide AI-Enabled Camera Network, Data Shows
How is this constitutional?
The short answer: it likely isn’t. But when has a lack of clear constitutional grounding ever stopped law enforcement from adopting new technology—especially when it expands their power?
Flock’s system collects and stores location data on millions of law-abiding people, without a warrant, probable cause, or individual suspicion. Legal scholars have raised serious Fourth Amendment concerns about this kind of mass surveillance.
On February 5, 2025, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia ruled that vehicle fingerprinting through pervasive camera surveillance likely violates the Fourth Amendment. The court found that this potential violation constituted a sufficient injury to give plaintiffs standing to sue the City of Norfolk, and it denied the City’s motion to dismiss—both on standing grounds and for failure to state a claim.
What can I do?
Three things:
1. Join us
As with any grassroots effort, our strength is in numbers and our ability to quickly mobilize when there is a need for swift action. We’ll never share your information with anyone outside our organization—and if we ever receive a government subpoena for it, we’ll fight back and let you know.
2. Come to the Coralville City Council meeting
Date:
July 8, 2025
Time:
6:30 PM
Address:
Coralville City Hall
1512 7th St.
Coralville, IA 52241
The City of Coralville has budgeted $19K to add Flock cameras this year. The Chief of Police quietly bundled the cameras into the police budget back in January and that budget was voted on in April, but the public didn’t hear about the Flock plans until they were briefly mentioned in a city work session on June 24.
Whether you show up with a sign, a comment for the city council, or simply quiet words of solidarity, your presence will make a real difference.
3. Share this site far and wide
Spreading the word is how we build power. The only way our voices will be heard is if enough people are raising theirs. Talk to friends and family, send them this link, post it on social media, text it to your group chats. Awareness is the first step to action—and without it, nothing changes.
Let’s make this impossible to ignore.
FOOTNOTES
1)
Police departments love new tech, though, and they rarely turn a critical eye toward it. And, as is often the case with markets, when Flock adoption reached critical mass, almost any rational objection ceased to matter. Many departments are installing the company’s cameras simply because others in their region are also doing so.
2)
Apparently, the fact that the societies claiming zero crime are often the ones where the greatest crimes are committed by the symbiosis of government and corporate power has never occurred to Mr. Langley.