The surveillance & liberty brief

Crow's Nest tracks license-plate readers, facial recognition, police surveillance and the wider civil-liberties beat, town by town. One free email each weekday morning, every line linked to the reporting it came from.

Follow: Bluesky Mastodon

Today's issue

Two Rivers cancels Flock Safety contract

Tuesday, November 3, 2026 · 18 stories · view as email

Top

Two Rivers council unanimously voted to end its Flock Safety contract.(NBC26)

Two Rivers to End Flock Surveillance Camera Contract Amid Public Backlash (Seehafer News)

Flock Safety enlisted active police officers to pitch license plate readers.(The Maine Monitor)

UK retail chains falsely accused shoppers of theft via facial recognition.(TechRadar)

Western Australia Police scanned 1,380,882 faces in a mobile facial recognition trial.(The Guardian)

General Motors will pay $7 million over claims OnStar sold driving data.(courthousenews.com)

Baltimore County Police expanded remote aerial drone observation to Dundalk.(Dundalk Eagle)

Flock watch

Taylor, Texas terminates Flock contract and disables eight readers(Taylor Press)

Renton police will end their contract for 24 Flock plate readers.(Courier-Herald)

Contractor Municipal Tax Services uses plate readers to tax cars for commissions.(Gadget Review)

Oklahoma rules warrantless Flock query violated Fourth Amendment(The Lancaster News)

Macon County, N.C. fired deputy over alleged Flock misuse(Carolina Public Press)

Surveillance & Privacy

St. Louis police department plans to deploy six drones to emergency calls.(www.stl.news)

Armenia opened its first biometric document center with private firm HayPass.(biometricupdate.com)

UK police deployed live facial recognition in London's Westminster and Croydon.(Punch Newspapers)

St. Louis police board will vote on rules for six drones.(Spectrum News)

Coming Up

Tue Nov 3

BallotArizona — Arizona voters decide Proposition 319 to prohibit new photo radar, red-light, or traffic-sign camera systems (KTAR.com)

Tue Nov 3

BallotBoulder, Colorado — Boulder voters elect mayor and city council candidates who have taken stances on city Flock license plate reader cameras (The Boulder Reporting Lab)

Tue Nov 3

BallotHollywood, FL — Citizen demands for the regulation or banning of Flock surveillance cameras factor into midterm elections (EL PAÍS English)

Tue Nov 3

BallotLeague City, Texas — League City voters decide Proposition A on whether police should continue using 55 Flock surveillance cameras (The Texas Tribune)

Tue Nov 3

BallotProvidence, RI — Mayoral election between David Morales and David Talan with the city's Flock surveillance contract at issue (WPRI.com)

Tue Nov 3

BallotRaleigh, NC — Raleigh voters elect City Council members and mayor amid debate over Flock license-plate surveillance cameras (Raleigh News and Observer)

Full calendar and .ics feed →

Speech & Press

Fifth Circuit orders en banc rehearing on Texas social-media monitoring mandates.(Reason)

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz called for an end to online anonymity.(Reason)

Protect Democracy sues under FOIA to compel disclosure of AI framework.(Gadget Review)

Useful

Street-Level Surveillance(sls.eff.org)

EFF's explainers on each police technology: what an ALPR, a drone, a cell-site simulator or a face recognition system actually does with your data.

All the tools and guides →

Past issues

Mon, Nov 2

UK police deployed live facial recognition

Fri, Oct 30

Twenty-six Maryland law enforcement…

Thu, Oct 29

Telangana police launch facial recognition

Wed, Oct 28

Flock Safety removed six license plate…

Tue, Oct 27

Suffolk Constabulary will deploy live…

Mon, Oct 26

New York passes license plate reader bill

Fri, Oct 23

Met Police deploys live facial recognition

Thu, Oct 22

A New Mexico judge orders Meta…

Wed, Oct 21

Madison County drops Flock Safety contract

Tue, Oct 20

ACLU warns ICE could target activists

Each issue is the day's brief as it went to subscribers. The feed has everything we tracked that did not make the email.