It’s widely known, certainly among my readers, that Atlanta-based Flock Group Inc. is violating the Fourth Amendment rights of Americans on a mass scale, and any local politicians or sheriffs who don’t realize that clearly don’t have even a basic understanding of what those rights consist of.
The Fourth Amendment protects the right of all Americans to be secure from unreasonable searches and seizures by the government. It also requires warrants to be based on probable cause and to describe the place and things to be searched or seized.
But a less recognized clash is taking shape between Flock’s AI surveillance grid and the Second Amendment, which gives citizens the right to keep and bear arms, part of which the courts have generally agreed forbids the creation of a national gun registry.
But what if every gun purchase is logged on a video and stored somewhere in a central database?
The Washington Times is reporting that gun shops are pulling down their Flock cameras following a growing number of complaints from customers who believe the cameras have turned into a monitoring network that threatens their gun rights.
Michael Carter, owner of Gun Commanders in Cleveland, Georgia, installed Flock cameras two years ago to combat burglars and help law enforcement nab illegal gun buyers.
He told the Times that he recently took down the cameras, which record license plate numbers and other data such as make, model, color, and even scratches, dents and bumper stickers to track vehicles entering and exiting his parking lot. He pulled the cameras after his customers complained and posted their criticisms on social media.
This is the latest component of a nationwide privacy-rights backlash against Flock’s AI-powered surveillance cameras popping up on street corners, in parks, parking lots, neighborhoods or on drones buzzing overhead.
Carter has taken the hint. If he values his customers, he had better ditch the AI surveillance cameras documenting everyone who comes to his shop to buy a gun.
“I installed the system with the best of intentions — to protect the people who walk through our doors every day,” Carter told Now Georgia. “After listening to my customers, I realized that maintaining their trust is more important than any piece of technology.”
Hellbound and Down 