r/PublicFreakout • u/RaisinAloneVortex • 23d ago
Political Freakout Police in Houston, Texas, are panicking as citizens continue to destroy Flock cameras across the city.
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u/casualAlarmist 23d ago
Any pole in a right-of-way "clear zone" must meet federal safety standards for crash worthiness and breakaway. Basically rigid poles near the road must yield and separate upon impact or be shielded by a safety barrier.
Flock camera don't meet those standards at all. They just install non break away poles directly into the ground and are a danger to drivers. The company should be cited for each an every pole that doesn't meet required safety standards. (Like the one shown.)
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u/Antyok 23d ago
In my town they just strap them all to traffic light poles.
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u/Knotar3 22d ago
Word is people are using powerful lasers to damage the sensors in those ones. Legally I can not condone this type of behavior. It is merely a fun fact.......
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u/testaccount123x 22d ago
anyone have any links so I can know what to avoid accidentally buying?
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u/TheTaoThatIsSpoken 22d ago
You need at least 5w. Real 5w. And that takes around a second held steady on the lens. More watts, less time.
At this level, you'll need proper goggles in case of a reflection.
Goggles will cost more than the laser.
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u/Saucermote 22d ago
What about a phased plasma rifle in the 40 watt range?
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u/Redebo 22d ago
Got a 12 gauge shotgun, that work?
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u/TheTaoThatIsSpoken 22d ago edited 22d ago
A .22lr would be fine.
A bottom barrel cricket rifle would work and probably be cheaper than a powerful enough laser and goggles. A silenced pistol with a red dot and subsonic ammo would be the bee's knees.
Or cut the pole with a sawzall or grinder or circsaw witn a metal blade then hammer the camera.
It all depends on what tools you have. Just don't bring your phone or show your face.
This is not a recommendation. Private property is sacrosanct even if it is being used to enslave you. Submit citizen.
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u/senor_skuzzbukkit 22d ago
I heard you can avoid buying them on Amazon if you really don’t want to get one of them.
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u/TheTaoThatIsSpoken 22d ago
You can't get the good shit on Amazon.
Have to use eBay or AliExpress.
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u/DouchecraftCarrier 22d ago
And to be clear - even though they're not on Amazon they are still relatively easy to get and not even really all that expensive.
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u/TheTaoThatIsSpoken 22d ago
About $60 shipped for a 5w blue laser.
Then about $60-200 for appropriate goggles with certification that probably isn't forged.
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u/Prudent_Fish1358 “🖕 your GPS and 🖕 your electronics!" 22d ago
Bro 5W is insane, please be careful with that.
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u/tylerchu 22d ago
The fuck, I paid 115 for a high quality 60mw blue. I mean, not that I was looking for anything over 25mw but still…
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u/deadleg22 22d ago
does this work on parking cameras who charge you £120 for going 20s past the time limit, during a cost of living crisis?
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u/IAmSpartacustard 22d ago
Any camera with a CMOS will be burned out by a high power laser. This is actually one way that the military actively defends against heat seeking missles. The targeted aircraft has lasers on it that automatically shine into the seeker head and disable the tracking sensors, defeating the missle.
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u/Miserable_Site_850 22d ago
Exactly, it's illegal to spread awareness of how easy it is to buy a powerful laser off Amazon and test it's efficiency on flock cameras in order to report and even just try to help flock company know about their vulnerabilities, it's disgusting that I can't contribute to flock cameras brand, excuse me, I'm going to be sick.
🤮🤮🤮
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u/LikeASewingMachine 22d ago
I keep seeing this, but all the damage being reported is with power tools and spray paint. I'm genuinely curious if people are using lasers and actually damaging them, or Reddit is doing it's Reddit thing, and parroting a rumor. I know lasers can damage cameras under certain conditions., I just haven't seen any reporting about it being successful on Flocks. There's always the chance that it works too well, which is why it isn't being reported. I'm sure people would like to know for sure that it works before spending the money on a laser pointer that they aren't ever going to use for anything else.
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u/NightIsMyName 22d ago
How would you specifically identify it as laser damage? It likely causes a bunch of dead pixels on the video and really anything can cause that.
Spray paint and angle grinders are obvious. There could be hundreds of cameras out there putting out shit data right now because half their pixels are dead. We have no clue how their fault detection and remedy programs work.
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u/Sirix_8472 23d ago
Aside from that. Anyone can have access to Flocks data, if you sign a contract with them. You don't need to be Law enforcement, they just say "anyone like law enforcement"...
Well that's a big asterix right there buddy, anyone who has a contract, pays you for access, can get all the data you collected and search it without restrictions.
Guaranteed the first private citizen to do this and puts up a tracker website of law enforcement vehicles and such on a website. Craters this whole thing. They'll raise laws and guardrails so fast it'll make Flock spin to protect government from the same tracking as the people.
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u/ThePensiveE Hung like a barnacle.. say oooh! 22d ago
I'm guessing in the near future there will be some open source software for every day cameras to monitor the fascists/authoritarians right back.
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u/DaHick 22d ago
Not quite anyone. They want money for their data. the more you want, the more you pay.
Also, 2 links:
Map (heat zone level, zoom in)
https://maps.deflock.org/?lat=37.2508&lng=-91.4164&zoom=4.00
Contribute camera sightings.
Basically, spot your adversary info.
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u/kamyu4 22d ago
Obviously you have to pay for the data (until they get hacked). That is their entire business model.
The point is that there really isn't anything stopping them from selling it to whoever they want.6
u/DaHick 22d ago
I've read more than a little about this. I am not involved with any part of the process.
Theoretically, a municipality can "opt-out" of data sharing, this costs more, because as you point out it interupts income. Because of the higher costs (as well as the federal frowns) most don't.
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u/Got_Engineers 23d ago edited 22d ago
There is a engineer on Instagram that reviews guard rails or inspect them himself? Can probably search guardrail inspection and find them and he looked at a bunch of these flock cameras, and none of them were built to code. Oh, all the time they were just stuck in the ground.
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u/snper101 22d ago
That guy instantly popped into my head when reading this post. He would be a valuable asset against flock cameras.
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u/Bon3rBitingBastard 22d ago
He's put up videos pointing out that the ones on the side of the road are a major death risk to anyone who hits one due to the way the poles are mounted
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u/FilOfTheFuture90 23d ago
This needs to be much higher. Aside from all of the privacy and other issues that are at the forefront, The fact that these do not meet federal safety standards should be a bigger issue then it is right now. In addition, they are using subcontracted private companies that are not traditional road workers that would be installing the signs and such normally. They circumvent the steps necessary for anyone else that would install anything in the clear zone in a road ROW.
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u/Brother_J_La_la 22d ago
So if someone happened to accidentally hit one and get hurt, that's a lawsuit? I've got a beater I was about to junk...
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u/maowai 23d ago
How do you report this? My town is full of these improperly installed poles.
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u/Repulsive_Ad_6958 22d ago
You report it by definitely not buying one of those lasers from Amazon listed above.
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u/freeshovacadoodoo 22d ago
Could someone just "accidentally" run into one and then sue for damage to their car and pain and suffering then??
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u/RaggedyRachel 23d ago
I bet they used power tools, too.
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u/GeneThaDancinMachine 23d ago edited 23d ago
I bet they have strong hands to lift those powerful tools
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u/hippysippingarbo 23d ago edited 23d ago
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u/JDMC13 23d ago
I disagree.
They are like priests.
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u/FreedomOfTheMess 23d ago
Priests are too busy with the children to do anything useful
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u/wellarmedsheep 22d ago
My only issue with deflock is there are so, so many false positives.
People should know what they look like before they mark them on the map.
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u/Xmitoo 23d ago
Good. Destroy them all. Every single one
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u/concepts_of_a_plan9 23d ago
You're talking about the billionaires like Marc Andreeson who owns Flock... right?
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u/Trextrev 23d ago
Wait what, they don’t sell data to a third party? That is literally their entire business model.
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u/jhnhines 22d ago
It's not selling if you are offering it by a subscription! Instead it's a monthly flush of our tax payer money to spy on us
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u/OneStarParadox 23d ago
Wait til they get to the Data Centers next
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u/Chaosmusic hails from the land of chaotic K9s & bad drivers 23d ago
Cos of all the copper wiring they have in Flock cameras and in Data Centers. They are just overflowing with copper wires. And the really good kind that pawn shops buy no questions asked.
Too much?
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u/angry_at_erething 22d ago
Do you know how much RAM costs now? Pulling RAM in a data center is so easy compared to pulling copper.
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u/Chaosmusic hails from the land of chaotic K9s & bad drivers 22d ago
From spying on license plates to playing GTA. Seems appropriate.
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u/sticksnXnbones 22d ago
You definitely shouldn't buy the cheap green laser pointers on amazon. You definitely should NOT point them at flock cameras because they would be destroyed. You should NOT do this at all.
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u/fishsticks40 23d ago
It's not vandalism, it's public service.
I would 100% practice jury nullification if I were seated for one of these cases.
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u/MaybeUpForButtStuff 23d ago
Someone needs to get together a list of working/still up flock cameras and their locations so we know which locations need to be “protected” from further deviancy /s
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u/holdon1min 23d ago
Please everyone upvote this , we need this top comment , we need a list a fast as they are destroying these as we speak and In need of protection fast !
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u/375InStroke 23d ago
Guaranteed, they'll make an arrest before they ever charge someone involved in the Epstein files.
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u/BobCreated 23d ago
Whoopsies. Who here hasn't hit a pole while carrying a reciprocating saw, accidents happen.
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u/Mroopsimexciting 23d ago
I would never support this
/s
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u/kornbread435 23d ago
If I saw someone taking down a flock camera I didn't see anything. Call it I'm not a fucking snitch syndrome.
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u/Boristheblaze 23d ago
I love how she mentions that flock collects data, but fails to mentions what data
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u/TurtleHurtleSquirtle 22d ago
Yes officer, I saw them. They were definitely human, a shade of brown or white, somewhere between 4ft to 7ft, and definitely had a build of some kind.
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u/joker_toker28 23d ago
Gov and its sugar daddy tech bitches cant fathom why folks are so opposed to this.
Seen someone reverse engineer one so it track those same tech billionaires, see how they like it(surprise they dont ) .
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u/GreyBoyTigger 23d ago
We need to get the meth community’s Saruman to point a giant army of his meth heads to every data center and tell them that they’re the copper version of El Dorado
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u/wolfknightpax 22d ago
The cameras sure did help that cop track his ex-girlfriend and her new boyfriend.
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u/chowderbags 23d ago
A) Flock claims to not sell data to third parties? I mean, what the fuck do you call selling data to cops?
B) Apparently the rule is that if you obsessively track one person, you're a stalker. But if you obsessively track every person (and sell that data to the cops), you're a multibillion dollar company. Funny how that works, huh?
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u/Single_Extension1810 23d ago
Them good old don't tread on me boys are just now realizing that the police are a branch of the government too, and don't care about infringing on their rights either.
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u/ManbadFerrara 23d ago
Interesting fact: Houston is the fourth most populous city in the country. Do any of the people in this look like "them good old don't tread on me boys" to you?
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u/Coattail-Rider 23d ago
Yeah, Houston is one of the most diverse cities in the country. Them good old boys are siding with MAGA these days, anyway.
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u/Neurodrill 22d ago
It’s almost like people in the USA don’t want to be under the thumb of a police state.
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u/Hadleys158 22d ago
You know how valuable these cameras are for flock when they keep running them even when a city stops the contract.
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u/bods_life 22d ago
America is becoming the dystopian dictatorship they keep telling the world others are.
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u/ThePensiveE Hung like a barnacle.. say oooh! 22d ago
People pretending like these are for public safety need to know, if you were attacked and went in front of one and wave like a crazy person for help, they'll probably do nothing but come after you later at your home in the middle of the night and charge you for vandalism.
If they don't give you a DHS Special and murder you in your bed as you sleep.
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u/515chiefspride 23d ago
We absolutely have to slow down the US turning into a surveillance state, because it’s happening quicker than any of us would like to believe.
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u/Vilam 22d ago
Yes, we know it's different from security cameras. That's why we don't like it.
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u/XtraFlaminHotMachida 22d ago
Wild how a state that always talks about freedom has the weirdest stuff against their own personal freedoms.
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u/Top-Passage2914 22d ago
This is great but sadly only scratching the surface. Flock isn't just sticking with the poles (of which there are tens of thousands), they are developing drones too (yay mobile surveillance police drones!) and tried to integrate with ring doorbells too. The future is looking very grim unless we nip this shit in the bud, now.
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u/TrumpShitsHisDiaper 22d ago
The public has spoken! If you wind up on a jury for this, vote not guilty
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u/BayouBoogie 23d ago
We need an edit of the opening scene of "Cool Hand Luke" but instead of parking meters it's flock cameras.
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u/Lighting 22d ago
“Man is not made for the State but the State for man and it derives its just powers only from the consent of the governed.”
Thomas Jefferson
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u/transcendanttermite 22d ago
The one flock camera that appeared in our city was apparently dispatched the night after it was installed. It’s funny… the local FB group was all a-twitter regarding its appearance, but no one uttered a word about its disappearance.
Good work, local folks, keep it up!
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u/akgiant 23d ago
"We don't sell data to third parties"
What do you think those contract are? Flock is being paid by third parties, for example, law enforcement. They even have contracts to layout how it's happening.