Flock Cameras and Immigration Enforcement

The short version

The immigration debate around Flock cameras is no longer a vague privacy worry. It is now a settings, hotlist, audit-log, and data-sharing fight.

Flock says it does not work with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, does not have an ICE contract, does not share customer data on its own, and says ICE does not have direct access to Flock cameras, systems, or data unless the agencies that control the data expressly allow it.

Critics are focused on the word direct. Public reporting and civil-liberties groups point to indirect paths: national lookup settings, federal pilot programs, NCIC hotlists, outside agencies searching on behalf of federal immigration officials, and local departments that did not fully understand what their sharing settings allowed.

What Flock says

Flock's May 2026 ICE statement says communities control federal data access and that sharing with federal agencies is disabled by default. It also says customers own and control their data, may limit or revoke access, and that Flock does not sell customer data.

The same statement says Flock had past federal pilot projects, including HSI from March 3 to May 1, 2025 and CBP from May 9 to August 24, 2025. Flock says all listed federal pilots have ended and that in August 2025 it publicly announced it would no longer conduct federal-agency pilots.

That is the company-side case. Flock is saying it is not secretly handing local plate data to ICE. For a city council, that is not enough by itself. The city still has to prove its own users, partner agencies, hotlists, lookup settings, and audit process do not create the access path residents are worried about.

Why direct access is not the whole issue

NPR reported in February 2026 that cities were reconsidering Flock contracts because of privacy concerns and federal immigration agents accessing local data. Its reporting said Santa Cruz was among California cities that learned local data had been shared with Flock's national network without city officials' knowledge or intent.

KQED reported in May 2026 that Berkeley extended its existing Flock ALPR contract but rejected a larger expansion after a leaked city attorney memo warned that Flock might not be able to comply with obligations not to share Berkeley data with other customers, including federal immigration enforcement and out-of-state agencies.

That is the practical problem. Even if ICE has no direct dashboard login to a city's Flock account, local data can still become exposed through settings, reciprocal sharing, partner agencies, hotlists, or searches that route through another law-enforcement user.

The hotlist problem

EFF reported in June 2026 that agencies using Flock ALPR systems commonly allow captured plates to be compared against FBI National Crime Information Center hotlists. EFF focused on one topic inside that system: the Immigration Violator hotlist.

EFF wrote that the Immigration Violator hotlist is populated exclusively by ICE, according to the NCIC operator manual, and that agencies can select which NCIC topics they subscribe to inside Flock administrative controls. If that topic is selected, EFF says a local agency may receive an alert that a vehicle ICE is looking for has been sighted.

Flock told EFF that ICE itself does not receive the alert. That still leaves a city with a serious policy question. If the local agency receives an ICE-derived alert and then contacts ICE or acts on it, residents will reasonably see that as immigration enforcement.

Bend shows how settings can become policy

The Source Weekly in Bend, Oregon reported in May 2026 that federal immigration officials, including ICE, CBP, and Homeland Security Investigations, accessed the Bend Police Department's Flock camera database 279 times in June 2025 during the first three weeks of a pilot program.

Bend police officials told the outlet they had not authorized those federal queries. The reported cause was a user error that left the Lookup function in its factory-default National setting. A police captain told the Source that National Lookup was a reciprocal sharing feature: when it was on, the department could query outside Oregon, but other agencies around the country could query Bend's information too.

That example is why residents do not accept broad assurances anymore. A city can say it does not intend immigration use, then discover the product settings created wider access than officials understood.

California cities have a different legal problem

California has a stronger ALPR legal framework than many states. KQED reported that California public agencies are barred under a 2015 state law from sharing license plate reader data with federal and out-of-state agencies and must follow strict privacy policies for that information.

Berkeley's fight shows how that legal promise becomes operational. KQED reported that many Bay Area agencies said they did not participate in National Lookup, but some alleged that wider sharing had been reactivated without their knowledge. The story also reported concern that data shared with a local jurisdiction could be at risk if that partner then shared information nationally.

For California cities, the question is not only whether Flock is legal. It is whether the current settings, sharing list, audit logs, and vendor controls prove compliance with California's ALPR and sanctuary-policy rules.

What cities should require before approval

Before approving or renewing Flock cameras, a city should require the current sharing settings, the complete agency-sharing list, the NCIC hotlist topics selected, audit-log exports, case-number requirements, user permissions, retention rules, and written limits on immigration-related use.

The city should also require proof that federal agencies, out-of-state agencies, fusion centers, task forces, private users, and partner departments cannot reach local reads directly or indirectly unless the city has approved that path in writing.

If officials say immigration enforcement is prohibited, they should publish the control that makes it true. A policy sentence is weak. A setting, an audit trail, a public report, and a contract remedy are stronger.

What residents should request

Residents should ask for the Flock contract, order form, data-sharing policy, agency-sharing list, audit logs, NCIC hotlist selections, transparency portal exports, public meeting record, retention schedule, and any correspondence about ICE, CBP, HSI, National Lookup, or federal pilots.

EFF specifically recommends requesting the NCIC topics selected inside Flock administrative controls. That matters because an agency can publicly prohibit immigration enforcement while still having an immigration-related hotlist selected.

The most useful public-record request is narrow and testable. Ask for settings and logs, not opinions. The answer should show whether the system is configured the way officials describe it.

The bottom line

The Flock immigration fight is not settled by asking whether Flock has an ICE contract. Flock says it does not. The real issue is whether local ALPR data can still help immigration enforcement through the network around the local account.

Cities that want Flock cameras need to govern the full chain: hotlists, lookup settings, partner searches, audit logs, user permissions, outside-agency requests, and vendor controls. Anything less leaves too much resting on trust.

For residents, the clearest question is simple: can the city prove that a local plate read will not become an immigration-enforcement lead without public approval. If the city cannot prove that, the contract is not ready.

Sources used

Flock Safety, Does Flock Share Data With ICE?, published January 6, 2026 and updated May 22, 2026: https://www.flocksafety.com/blog/does-flock-share-data-with-ice

NPR, Why some cities are ditching their Flock license plate readers, updated February 19, 2026: https://www.npr.org/2026/02/17/nx-s1-5612825/flock-contracts-canceled-immigration-survillance-concerns

Electronic Frontier Foundation, Are Your Local Police Using Flock Safety ALPRs to Scan for Immigrants?, June 25, 2026: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2026/06/are-your-local-police-using-flock-safety-alprs-scan-immigrants

KQED, Berkeley Extends Surveillance Contract With Flock Safety but Rejects Major Expansion, May 8, 2026: https://www.kqed.org/news/12082887/berkeley-extends-surveillance-contract-with-flock-safety-but-rejects-major-expansion

The Source Weekly, Federal Immigration Officials Made 279 Queries into Bend's Flock Safety Data in its First Three Weeks, May 6, 2026: https://www.bendsource.com/news/localnews/federal-immigration-officials-made-279-queries-into-bends-flock-safety-data-in-its-first-three-weeks/

ACLU, Fight Creepy ALPR Cameras, last updated June 29, 2026: https://www.aclu.org/campaigns-initiatives/get-the-flock-out