Texans have a special way of dealing with infringements on privacy and the freedoms we enjoy. Unregistered drones surveying our properties out in the sticks? That’s what the 12-gauge home defense system is for. Red light cameras that often prioritize revenue and control over public safety? The Texas legislature passed a law to ban that. Waiting for a glacially slow U.S. Congress to pass a Digital Bill of Rights? Federalism makes clear we had to take matters into our own hands.

Clearly, Texans understand that privacy is a fundamental prerequisite to being free — and that’s on both sides of the aisle. Polling conducted by my organization, the Texas Public Policy Foundation, suggests nine out of 10 Texans believe as much. So it comes as no surprise that activists and advocates on both sides of the aisle share ire over Flock and similar Automated License Plate Readers (ALPRs).

And it also means the Texas Legislature will almost certainly do something about it next session.

ALPRs are not a new concept. Like many surveillance programs, it began as an effort to combat terrorism, providing a novel method that allowed law enforcement to forgo visual inspection and the time-consuming process of obtaining warrants and registration information. American police departments began using rudimentary ALPRs in the 2000s, arguing they “enhance their enforcement and investigative capabilities…[and] expedite the tedious and time-consuming process of comparing vehicle license plates with vehicles of interest.”

Whether unsophisticated ALPRs in the early days were a worthwhile investment is up for debate. Proponents of Flock will point to the long history of this technology as a reason not to fret over the current political landscape, but I’m not interested in that red herring. The reality is that technological shifts from simple contrast algorithms to advanced AI, pixelated cameras to high-resolution photos that can capture clear shots in all conditions, and wide-angle lenses that can capture four or more times the number of lanes and cars as older cameras have given rise to the narrative of mass surveillance.

A police force in New York once boasted of capturing the license plates of 10,000 vehicles in a day; whereas a 2020 California state auditor report revealed that Sacramento’s Police Department recorded 24 times that amount, with close to 250,000 photos captured daily.

Proponents will quickly assert that these cameras only capture license plates, vehicle characteristics, distinguishing features (bumper stickers and license plate frames), and time and direction. But much like with brokers harvesting and selling your online data, it is not the individual data point that has inherent value. It’s the fact that there is a stunning arsenal of these data-siphoning cameras across the nation, connecting all of those data points to generate a larger, far more invasive picture than a single snapshot in time. And this is precisely why there has been a well-documented cadre of police officers making use of this database to monitor their wives, exes, or random strangers.

As author and researcher Matthew Crawford puts it in reference to digital surveillance writ large, “The appeal, surely lies in not having to do things that we normally do for ourselves. The convenience may be worth the price; that’s for each of us to decide. But to do so with open eyes, one has to understand what the price is.”

If we are relying on an opaque, cherry-picked narrative of what personal information ALPRs can capture, how it is stored, the motive for retaining certain data, and to whom it is ultimately sold or transferred, we can’t possibly be informed enough to know the price of “enhanced safety.” Even worse, none of us even clicked “accept” to the terms of service while driving down I-35. Not only do we not know the price, but we also have no say in the matter.

While we may be losing the battle as digital technologies, smart homes, and smart devices silently colonize our lives, Flock has struck a nerve and given rise to a national conversation that our privacy and freedom demand.

This last legislative session, multiple bills were filed in Texas that would have required a warrant to use ALPRs, along with transparent internal policies and reporting, and a narrowing in scope for camera utilization. While nothing made it to Governor Greg Abbott’s desk last session, the playbook is ready to go, and the tide has certainly shifted.

But we can’t rely on vandalism. That ire must be channeled productively.

Require a warrant. Put a hard clock on retention measured in days, not years. Bar sharing with out-of-state and federal agencies without a Texas judge’s signature. Publish the audit logs. Give Texans standing to ensure our privacy is not violated.

A camera that can find a stolen truck can still do that under every one of those conditions — and if a vendor tells you otherwise, it was never really about the stolen truck.

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David Dunmoyer is the Associate Vice President of Campaigns at the Texas Public Policy Foundation.

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Flock Cameras Are An Assault On Your Constitutional Freedoms