Amid mounting concerns about its sprawling surveillance camera network, Flock Security told the press this summer that it operates more than 120,000 cameras nationwide. But a new map published Wednesday by a cybersecurity researcher reveals Flock’s nationwide reach is even bigger. Based on location coordinates from Flock’s own database, the map shows more than 170,000 cameras, plus more than 130,000 accompanying gadgets that play a part in the company’s expansive American surveillance network. Joshua Michael’s Flock Surveillance Map highlights the locations of what he says are 300,000 Flock surveillance devices spread across the country. His findings — which were cited in Wednesday’s Senate Subcommittee on Crime and Counterterrorism hearing on Flock — differ from existing maps of Flock’s automated license plate readers in scope and methodology. > “These cameras form a nationwide surveillance network that tracks where everyone drives.” Unlike crowd-sourced projects such as DeFlock, which are built on locations submitted by users, the Flock Surveillance Map relies on location data culled from a snapshot, archived by Michael in December 2025, of Flock’s own records. In addition to cameras, it maps supplemental devices — including 27,000 acoustic detection devices, as well as networking equipment that integrates third-party cameras — to illustrate the scale of Flock’s surveillance web. “These cameras form a nationwide surveillance network that tracks where everyone drives,” Michael told The Intercept, “so foreign nations don’t need to send spies to harm our country. They can simply watch where our soldiers, federal agents, and politicians go.” ## Most Read DoorDash Spent $1.4 Million Trying to Stop Mamdani From Becoming Mayor. Now We Know Why. Meghnad Bose, Macy Hanzlik-Barend Robert Kraft Claims His Donations Help Palestinians. Turns Out He’s Funding Friends of the IDF. Jonah Valdez Pink Supported Macklemore’s Firing. Now Activists Want UNICEF to Cut Ties With Her. Jonah Valdez The Intercept visited six random Arizona locations on Michael’s map; each location had a Flock camera present at the indicated coordinates. The Flock Surveillance Map also color-codes each Flock device according to its model — showing, for instance, whether the device is a Flock camera, known as a Falcon, or an accompanying processing unit known as a Picard. (Flock did not immediately respond to a request for comment.) The accompanying searchable dataset table also lists each camera’s individual name, as outlined in Flock’s database, which typically includes a street address and sometimes other identifying characteristics. A camera with the name “FBI Pilot Camera,” for example, is shown to be located at the J. Edgar Hoover Building — the FBI headquarters in Washington. ## Related ### Cops Are Using Flock to Spy on People for the Crime of Standing Around The map illustrates Flock’s national spread, but also its clustering in certain areas. For example, 860 Flock devices appear to be concentrated just outside Chicago O’Hare International Airport, at the Rosemont Public Safety Department, which provides police, fire, and emergency medical services in the Chicago suburb. Numerous Flock cameras appear to be installed inside detention centers. A camera titled “C-F-23 FOXTROT MALE HOLDING 2/SHOWERS” appears at the coordinates of the Silverdale Detention Center in Chattanooga, Tennessee. ## We’re independent of corporate interests — and powered by members. Join us. Become a member ## Join Our Newsletter Thank You For Joining! Original reporting. Fearless journalism. Delivered to you. Will you take the next step to support our independent journalism by becoming a member of The Intercept? I'm in Become a member By signing up, I agree to receive emails from The Intercept and to the Privacy Policy and Terms of Use. ## Join Our Newsletter ## Original reporting. Fearless journalism. Delivered to you. I'm in In November 2025, Michael discovered a novel way to identify the location of Flock’s devices. Trawling the company’s website, he realized that Flock’s servers were publicly leaking data in the form of an access token that could be acquired without needing to log in. With that token, Michael said he could query ArcGIS, a third-party geographic information system platform used by Flock, to retrieve the locations of Flock devices. Michael told The Intercept he promptly contacted Flock and described his findings. As Michael wrote in his initial email to Flock on November 13, 2025: “all testing was strictly non-intrusive, limited to open unauthenticated endpoints, and did not involve bypassing authentication, modifying data, or invoking any billable ArcGIS or Google operations.” Michael said he didn’t receive a reply, so he followed up with Flock the next day, and a third time several days later. After his third attempt to inform Flock of the discovered vulnerability, Michael received a reply from a Flock that said, “Thank you for the findings. We are internally triaging them and will reach back out with next steps soon.” ## Related ### License Plate Surveillance, Courtesy of Your Homeowners Association Michael said he never heard back about it from Flock. In December 2025, Michael downloaded the Flock device location data, and in January wrote an in-depth technical blogpost about his what he had found. After Michael’s post, it appears that Flock fixed the vulnerability. Despite being alerted of Michael’s findings in November 2025, Flock published its own blogpost the following January saying it hadn’t had any data breaches. “Flock has never been hacked, and there has not been a leak of Flock information,” the company claimed. “Flock Safety’s cloud platform has never experienced a data breach.” The Atlanta-based startup has faced mounting criticism for its practices and transparency in recent months. An American Civil Liberties Union report found “a pattern of Flock regularly misleading or even lying about its business practices, safety record, commitment to privacy, and efforts to protect vulnerable populations.” Michael told The Intercept that Flock’s recent claims about its data security record don’t reflect reality. Flock has publicly claimed multiple times that the company has never experienced a data breach, “and this was after I pulled their database of devices.” “That leaves two possibilities,” he said. “Either they knew and chose not to disclose it for fear of bad press, or they didn’t know I exfiltrated the data at all. The first is a transparency failure. The second is a detection failure with national security implications.” On Thursday, Michael was notified that Doppel, which describes itself as an “AI-native social engineering defense platfom,” filed a trademark infringement complaint regarding his site, claiming to be working on Flock’s behalf. Doppel says that the site is using the trademark “FLOCK SAFETY” without authorization, which “may cause customer confusion / harm.” Doppel requested the site be taken down. When he posted the Flock Surveillance Map, Michael included a pop-up disclaimer saying that the site is “not affiliated with or endorsed by Flock.” Share * Copy link * Share on Facebook * Share on Bluesky * Share on X * Share on LinkedIn * Share on WhatsApp _IT’S EVEN WORSE THAN WE THOUGHT._ What we’re seeing right now from Donald Trump is a full-on authoritarian takeover of the U.S. government. This is not hyperbole. Court orders are being ignored. MAGA loyalists have been put in charge of the military and federal law enforcement agencies. The Department of Government Efficiency has stripped Congress of its power of the purse. News outlets that challenge Trump have been banished or put under investigation. Yet far too many are still covering Trump’s assault on democracy like politics as usual, with flattering headlines describing Trump as “unconventional,” “testing the boundaries,” and “aggressively flexing power.” The Intercept has long covered authoritarian governments, billionaire oligarchs, and backsliding democracies around the world. We understand the challenge we face in Trump and the vital importance of press freedom in defending democracy. ## We’re independent of corporate interests. Will you help us? $15 $25 $50 $100 $5 $8 $10 $15 One Time Monthly Donate **_IT’S BEEN A DEVASTATING_** year for journalism — the worst in modern U.S. history. We have a president with utter contempt for truth aggressively using the government’s full powers to dismantle the free press. Corporate news outlets have cowered, becoming accessories in Trump’s project to create a post-truth America. Right-wing billionaires have pounced, buying up media organizations and rebuilding the information environment to their liking. In this most perilous moment for democracy, The Intercept is fighting back. But to do so effectively, we need to grow. **That’s where you come in. Will you help us expand our reporting capacity in time to hit the ground running in 2026?** ## We’re independent of corporate interests. Will you help us? $15 $25 $50 $100 $5 $8 $10 $15 One Time Monthly Donate **_I’M BEN MUESSIG,_** The Intercept’s editor-in-chief. It’s been a devastating year for journalism — the worst in modern U.S. history. We have a president with utter contempt for truth aggressively using the government’s full powers to dismantle the free press. Corporate news outlets have cowered, becoming accessories in Trump’s project to create a post-truth America. Right-wing billionaires have pounced, buying up media organizations and rebuilding the information environment to their liking. In this most perilous moment for democracy, The Intercept is fighting back. But to do so effectively, we need to grow. **That’s where you come in. Will you help us expand our reporting capacity in time to hit the ground running in 2026?** ## We’re independent of corporate interests. Will you help us? $15 $25 $50 $100 $5 $8 $10 $15 One Time Monthly Donate ## Contact the author: Nikita Mazurov ## Related ### Apocalypse Now: Naomi Klein and Astra Taylor Investigate the End-Timers Alliance ### Facing Outraged Residents, Flock Got Help From Group That Uses AI to Rally Public Support ### Cops Are Using Flock to Spy on People for the Crime of Standing Around ### Flock Donations to Local Politicians’ Groups Skyrocket as Protests Against AI Cameras Mount ## Latest Stories Targeting Iran ### Congress Failed Again to Stop Trump’s Iran War. This Group Is Trying Through the Courts. Noah Hurowitz - Sep. 24 “It is all hands on deck to stop this full-blown constitutional crisis,” said the head of NIAC Action, which filed suit on behalf of Iranian Americans. ### Green Energy Is Coming for the Desert Joshua Frank - Sep. 24 Trump’s Bureau of Land Management is pushing to aggressively expand solar farms into the Mojave Desert, which advocates say would decimate its vast biodiversity. ### As the Pentagon Expands Across the Pacific, Guam Offers a Warning Anita Hofschneider - Sep. 24 The U.S. militarization of Guam has left its residents living with a legacy of pollution, environmental degradation, and cultural loss. Other Pacific islands may be next. Join The Conversation

###### **For Immediate Release: September 11, 2026** **Office of the Attorney General** – Jennifer Davenport, _Attorney General_ ###### **For Further Information:** **Media Inquiries-** Allison Inserro OAGpress@njoag.gov Joint Motion to Stay | Settlement Agreement **TRENTON** – Attorney General Jennifer Davenport, as part of a coalition of 23 attorneys general and two governors, has reached a settlement that bars the Trump Administration from seeking to cut almost all funding from the AmeriCorps program again without warning. The deal resolves a 2025 lawsuit filed in response to the Administration’s repeated attempts to gut the nation’s volunteer service programs. Previously, as a result of the lawsuit, the Trump Administration was forced to reinstate nearly $400 million in terminated AmeriCorps programs and agreed to release over $184 million in funds to service programs in across the country. The cuts prevented by the lawsuit had threatened the survival of those programs—including more than $6.6 million in funds for AmeriCorps programs in New Jersey. This settlement protects the funding and participants of those programs for fiscal year 2026 as well. “AmeriCorps members are indispensable to organizations across New Jersey, working as critical volunteers in our communities,” **said Attorney General Davenport**. “While this disruption never should have happened in the first place, I am pleased that by uniting together, states were able to not only stop these unannounced and drastic cuts to these important programs, but also to take steps to prevent this from happening again.” In New Jersey, AmeriCorps members support a wide variety of programs, including recovery programs for individuals who have experienced addiction, educational programs for adults learning English, academic mentoring programs for children with special needs, maintaining parks and green spaces in urban areas, and disaster recovery and relief programs. AmeriCorps supports national and state community service programs by funding and placing volunteers in local and national organizations that address critical community needs. Organizations rely on support from AmeriCorps to recruit, place, and supervise AmeriCorps members nationwide. In April 2025, the Trump Administration moved to eliminate nearly 90% of AmeriCorps’ workforce, cancel its contracts, and close $400 million worth of AmeriCorps-supported programs. The coalition states sued and in June 2025, a federal court granted the states’ motion for a preliminary injunction requiring the administration to reinstate programs that had been unlawfully canceled. Then in August 2025, following a further motion for preliminary injunction by the coalition, the federal Office of Management and Budget agreed to release more than $184 million in AmeriCorps funding it had withheld. Now, under the terms of this settlement, AmeriCorps states that moving forward it does not anticipate that, during fiscal year 2026, it will terminate grants on a large scale as it did in spring 2025, conduct reductions in force of union employees beyond certain previously planned cuts, or dismiss a large number of AmeriCorps service members. Should AmeriCorps take any of those actions, or make a material change to its delivery of volunteer services, it must provide the coalition states with written notice at least 30 days in advance and identify the legal authority under which it is taking the action. AmeriCorps has also agreed to commit substantially all of its fiscal year 2026 funding by September 30, 2026, and to administer its National Civilian Community Corps (NCCC) and AmeriCorps VISTA programs in accordance with the federal statutes that govern them. Under the settlement, AmeriCorps may not disrupt the current terms of service of NCCC or VISTA participants, except under specific, lawful circumstances detailed in the settlement. The settlement pauses the litigation through February 1, 2027, at which point the states will voluntarily dismiss the case without prejudice, provided AmeriCorps has complied with its commitments. Should the states determine that AmeriCorps has not complied, they may move the court to lift the stay and resume litigation. The states also retain the right to challenge other unlawful conduct by AmeriCorps, whether through an amended complaint during the stay or a new action during or after the stay. Attorney General Davenport was joined in the settlement by the attorneys general of Maryland, California, Colorado, and Delaware, which co-led the coalition, along with Arizona, Connecticut, the District of Columbia, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington, and Wisconsin, as well as the governors of Kentucky and Pennsylvania. ###

The president lost his last positive issue, and the gap between strong disapproval and strong approval is now nearly 3-to-1 (50% vs 17%)

Axel Springer will honor Peter Thiel with its 2026 award despite the billionaire investor's role in the lawsuit that led to Gawker's collapse

Axel Springer will honor Peter Thiel with its 2026 award despite the billionaire investor's role in the lawsuit that led to Gawker's collapse

On Conspicuous Despair, the Ponzi stage of being alive, and why your grandparents are wrong about you.

The moderate's delusion.

The use of social media in planning violent protests over the Belfast knife attack has drawn condemnation, with Britain's ruling Labour Party accusing Elon Musk of stoking divisions. The tech billiona...