Latest / The Kevin Stone Podcast / Episode #39 "Senate Judiciary Meeting Flock Cameras"

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Episode #39 "Senate Judiciary Meeting Flock Cameras" · The Kevin Stone Podcast

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  Speaker 1: The content of this podcast is for entertainment purposes only.
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  Speaker 1: Mainly the entertainment of the podcast creator. If at any
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  Speaker 1: time you find any of this to be offensive, you
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  Speaker 1: should immediately rewind the program and start it from the beginning.
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  Speaker 1: The sarcasm provided in this program is so accurate it
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  Speaker 1: is illegal in 14 states.
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  Speaker 2: You are listening to the Kevin Stone Podcast, broadcasting to
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  Speaker 2: you from an undisclosed location.
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  Speaker 3: Customized listening.
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  Speaker 2: Let's begin by cleaning those ears. Who am I?
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  Speaker 1: I'm a nobody. I just happen to have a camera
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  Speaker 1: and a microphone and an internet connection.
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  Speaker 2: Which makes me a superstar.
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  Speaker 1: I have beef enchiladas in the oven. What? Yes.
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  Speaker 2: And you made them or are they frozen?
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  Speaker 1: Well, they won't be frozen in about 35 minutes. Hey,
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  Speaker 1: I made it at the house, so it's homemade. I'm
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  Speaker 1: going to admit something today. I was wrong. Yeah, somebody
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  Speaker 1: write that down because I don't know how often we're
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  Speaker 1: going to hear Kevin Stone say that on this podcast. Actually,
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  Speaker 1: that may not entirely be true. If you've seen the
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  Speaker 1: artwork for the Kevin Stone podcast, you've seen my coffee mug.
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  Speaker 1: It says, I don't know what I'm talking about. Apparently,
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  Speaker 1: that's not just branding. It's a disclaimer. Because when I
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  Speaker 1: first started looking at these flock cameras, which we've talked
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  Speaker 1: about on this podcast, I had a pretty simple opinion.
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  Speaker 1: If you ain't got nothing to hide, you ain't got
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  Speaker 1: nothing to worry about. I'm not committing crimes. I'm not
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  Speaker 1: running from the police. I'm not trafficking drugs. If a
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  Speaker 1: camera takes a picture of my license plate going down
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  Speaker 1: the highway, who cares? Well, I care now because I
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  Speaker 1: didn't understand the entire issue. After listening to a United
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  Speaker 1: States Senate Judiciary hearing about flock's nationwide license plate reader network,
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  Speaker 1: I realized something. I was asking the wrong question. This
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  Speaker 1: isn't about whether Kevin Stone has anything to hide. It's
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  Speaker 1: about whether Kevin Stone has done anything that gives the
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  Speaker 1: government a reason to be looking at him in the
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  Speaker 1: first place. And there's a big difference between those two questions. Yesterday,
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  Speaker 1: I listened to a Senate Judiciary Subcommittee hearing called Always Watching.
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  Speaker 1: It blocks Nationwide AI Surveillance Network. And one witness in
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  Speaker 1: particular changed the way I look at this. Her name
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  Speaker 1: is Lindsay Isaacs. She wasn't hiding from anybody. She wasn't
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  Speaker 1: trying to avoid a camera. She says she wasn't even
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  Speaker 1: involved in the accident police were investigating. Yet information from
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  Speaker 1: a flock camera became part of an investigation that eventually
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  Speaker 1: turned her life upside down. Listen to this.
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  Speaker 4: I later learned that a flock automated license plate recognition
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  Speaker 4: camera had captured my Dodge Durango approximately two to three
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  Speaker 4: miles west of the crash scene. Investigators were looking for
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  Speaker 4: a black Dodge Durango. I also later learned that the
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  Speaker 4: witnesses had described a maroon Dodge Durango as being involved
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  Speaker 4: in this crash and and that 911 callers provided information
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  Speaker 4: about that vehicle, including a partial license plate of, despite
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  Speaker 4: this information, the investigation continued to focus on me and
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  Speaker 4: my vehicle.
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  Speaker 1: Now, remember my original argument. If you ain't got nothing
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  Speaker 1: to hide, you ain't got nothing to worry about. What
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  Speaker 1: exactly was Lindsay Isaacs supposed to be hiding? That's where
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  Speaker 1: my argument starts to fall apart. Because now we're not
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  Speaker 1: talking about somebody using surveillance technology to find a known criminal.
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  Speaker 1: We're talking about information collected about an ordinary person's vehicle
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  Speaker 1: becoming part of an investigation into something she says she
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  Speaker 1: didn't do. And it gets worse.
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  Speaker 4: The following day, April 29th, I was finally granted bond.
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  Speaker 4: After 13 days in jail, I ran into my mother
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  Speaker 4: and father's arms. I could not believe I was free.
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  Speaker 4: In May 2026, the state ultimately declined to prosecute me
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  Speaker 4: and filed a no information and information was never filed
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  Speaker 4: against me. The investigation instead resulted in charges against another individual.
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  Speaker 4: I came here today because I want you to understand
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  Speaker 4: that surveillance technology does not exist in a vacuum. Information
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  Speaker 4: collected by technology can become part of an investigation that
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  Speaker 4: affects a real human being. In my case, a flock
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  Speaker 4: camera captured my vehicle a few miles from the scene
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  Speaker 4: of a terrible crash. That piece of information became part
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  Speaker 4: of an investigation that ultimately led to my arrest on
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  Speaker 4: three counts of vehicular homicide and 13 days in jail
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  Speaker 4: for a crash I had nothing to do with. I'm
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  Speaker 4: not here to tell you how to do your jobs.
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  Speaker 4: I'm here to tell you what happened to me.
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  Speaker 1: 13 days. 13 days in jail. And that is what
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  Speaker 1: killed my original argument. Because she didn't need something to hide.
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  Speaker 1: She needed the information being used about her to be
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  Speaker 1: correct and properly verified. Now I want to be fair here.
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  Speaker 1: A flock camera didn't arrest Lindsay Isaac. A computer didn't
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  Speaker 1: put her in handcuffs. Human beings made those decisions. So
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  Speaker 1: I'm not going to sit here and blame every mistake
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  Speaker 1: in that investigation on a camera. But that camera-generated information
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  Speaker 1: became part of the process. And suddenly my little, well,
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  Speaker 1: I ain't doing nothing wrong, so what do I care,
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  Speaker 1: doesn't sound quite as intelligent as I thought it did.
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  Speaker 1: A coffee mug strikes again. There's another lesson here that
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  Speaker 1: applies to me just as much as anybody else. Know
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  Speaker 1: what you're complaining about before you start complaining. That's something
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  Speaker 1: I preach on this podcast. Don't read one Facebook post
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  Speaker 1: and suddenly become an expert. Don't hear somebody at a
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  Speaker 1: gas station say something and suddenly you've solved the case.
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  Speaker 1: Go find the information. And apparently Kevin needs to follow
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  Speaker 1: Kevin's own advice too. Because my original opinion about flock
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  Speaker 1: cameras was formed before I understood enough about what these
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  Speaker 1: systems were actually capable of doing. I learned more. I
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  Speaker 1: listened to people who knew more about it than I did,
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  Speaker 1: and my opinion changed. That's not weakness. That's what is
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  Speaker 1: supposed to happen when new information proves that your old
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  Speaker 1: argument wasn't good enough. This is where Sheriff Ross Teeple
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  Speaker 1: really got my attention, because here's a sheriff, law enforcement,
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  Speaker 1: and he wasn't saying technology is bad. In fact, he
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  Speaker 1: talked about automated license plate readers being useful police tools.
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  Speaker 2: Let me be entirely clear.
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  Speaker 5: Automated Automatic license plate readers or ALPRs are a great tool.
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  Speaker 5: Technology that is strictly limited to reading a license plate
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  Speaker 5: helps us solve crimes, catch dangerous criminals, and find missing people.
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  Speaker 5: It allows us to cross-reference plates against stolen vehicle database
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  Speaker 5: or respond to active AMBER alerts instantly. Under the Supreme
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  Speaker 5: Court's landmark 2020 ruling and Kansas v. Glover, running a
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  Speaker 5: license plate to check registration status provides the reasonable suspicion
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  Speaker 5: that needed to make a proactive traffic stop. Used properly,
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  Speaker 5: point-in-time license plate reading is common sense policing.
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  Speaker 1: And I agree with him. If somebody steals my truck,
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  Speaker 1: use the camera, please. I'll give you a picture of
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  Speaker 1: the truck. I'll give you the license plate number. I'll
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  Speaker 1: probably help you look. Use technology to find stolen vehicles.
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  Speaker 1: Use it to find missing people. Use legitimate police tools
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  Speaker 1: to catch dangerous criminals. That's not where I've changed my mind.
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  Speaker 1: I've changed my mind about the idea that because technology
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  Speaker 1: can help law enforcement, I therefore shouldn't care about limits
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  Speaker 1: on that technology. Because listen to what the same sheriff
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  Speaker 1: said next.
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  Speaker 5: If my deputies need a search warrant to put a
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  Speaker 5: physical tracker on a vehicle, where is the line for
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  Speaker 5: camera systems that build an identical AI-driven map of a
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  Speaker 5: citizen's life?
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  Speaker 1: That's the question. That's what I wasn't thinking about before.
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  Speaker 1: If police want to physically attach a tracking device to
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  Speaker 1: my vehicle and follow everywhere I went, I'd have some questions.
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  Speaker 1: Probably quite a few questions. And I'd probably suddenly remember
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  Speaker 1: the Fourth Amendment. So why shouldn't I ask questions when
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  Speaker 1: technology can potentially accomplish something similar without physically attaching anything
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  Speaker 1: to my truck? That's where I've got nothing to hide
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  Speaker 1: stops being the right answer. The Fourth Amendment isn't the
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  Speaker 1: Kevin's got nothing to hide amendment. It's a limitation on
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  Speaker 1: government power. And I don't want to live in a
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  Speaker 1: 1984 society where the answer to privacy concerns becomes, don't
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  Speaker 1: worry about who's watching you. If you're innocent, you'll be fine.
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  Speaker 1: Nothing to see here, citizen. Move along. Lindsay Isaac thought
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  Speaker 1: she was innocent, too, and she spent 13 days in jail. Now,
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  Speaker 1: here's something about this hearing that I genuinely appreciated. It
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  Speaker 1: was bipartisan, and Lord knows I wasn't expecting that. Republicans
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  Speaker 1: and Democrats were raising many of the same concerns about
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  Speaker 1: privacy in Americans' constitutional rights. One of the exchanges that
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  Speaker 1: stood out to me came from Senator Katie Britt.
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  Speaker 6: I think two things can be true at the same time. One,
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  Speaker 6: we want to keep and make sure that our law
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  Speaker 6: enforcement officers have what they need to keep Americans safe,
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  Speaker 6: to help make sure that children who have been abducted
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  Speaker 6: get home. But we must protect people's Fourth Amendment rights.
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  Speaker 6: And when we're looking at this... I WANT TO MAKE
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  Speaker 6: SURE THAT WE'RE KIND OF LOOKING AT THE TOTAL PICTURE.
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  Speaker 6: SENATOR WARNOCK AND I CAME TOGETHER AND WROTE A LETTER,
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  Speaker 6: AND MR. CHAIRMAN, I'D LIKE TO ASK UNANIMOUS CONSENT THAT
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  Speaker 6: THIS BE SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD.
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  Speaker 2: THANK YOU.
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  Speaker 6: WE TALKED ABOUT OUR GREAT CONCERN OVER THE WIDESPREAD REPORTS
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  Speaker 6: THAT THERE WAS MISUSE REGARDING THESE AUTOMATIC LICENSE PLATE READERS.
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  Speaker 6: IN HERE WE TALK ABOUT MANY OF THE GOOD THINGS
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  Speaker 6: THAT WE THINK HAVE RESULTED, BUT ULTIMATELY believe that appropriate
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  Speaker 6: safeguards are necessary to protect against the unauthorized access and
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  Speaker 6: abuse that has come to light.
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  Speaker 1: And that is the conversation I want our government having.
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  Speaker 1: Law enforcement needs effective tools. Americans need constitutional protections. Those
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  Speaker 1: ideas don't have to be enemies. And what impressed me
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  Speaker 1: was watching people from both political parties seem willing to
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  Speaker 1: work on that same problem. Republicans had concerns. Democrats had concerns.
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  Speaker 1: Different politicians approached it differently, obviously, but there was a
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  Speaker 1: surprising amount of common ground. It was actually refreshing. Congress
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  Speaker 1: working together on something affecting ordinary Americans. I know, I
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  Speaker 1: checked too. Apparently, I hadn't accidentally changed the channel to
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  Speaker 1: the Hallmark movie. But there was a part where my
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  Speaker 1: political antenna went up. up. California Senator Alex Padilla started
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  Speaker 1: asking specific questions about ICE and ICE's ability to access
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  Speaker 1: information from the system. And he asked Chad Marlow of
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  Speaker 1: the ACLU. Now, before I tell you what Kevin thinks,
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  Speaker 1: listen to Senator Padilla yourself.
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  Speaker 2: Broad data sharing.
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  Speaker 3: Is it happening or is it not happening? Flock claims
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  Speaker 3: that it does not partner with ICE and that ICE
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  Speaker 3: does not have direct access to Flock cameras or their
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  Speaker 3: systems or their data. But we know that ICE is
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  Speaker 3: still able to access Flock data through state and local
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  Speaker 3: law enforcement agencies that have entered into agreements, cooperative agreements
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  Speaker 3: with ICE known as 287G agreements. So can you explain
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  Speaker 3: in more detail how these agreements can function as a
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  Speaker 3: loophole for ICE or other immigration enforcement agencies to access
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  Speaker 3: data that they otherwise couldn't?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, thank you, Senator. It's a great question. So you
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  Speaker 2: actually quoted from Flock themselves, which I think shows the problem.
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  Speaker 2: First of all, I would point out Flock seems to
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  Speaker 2: change its story from week to week. It's hard to
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  Speaker 2: even run. But they did say for a long period
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  Speaker 2: of time that ICE does not have direct access to
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  Speaker 2: Flock data. And that was true. But the key word
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  Speaker 2: there is direct.
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  Speaker 6: Exactly.
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  Speaker 2: Exactly. And so it doesn't even take a 287G agreement,
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  Speaker 2: although that's obviously a major problem. All it takes is
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  Speaker 2: one officer in one department who is a customer of
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  Speaker 2: FLAC and participates in their nationwide data sharing program. And
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  Speaker 2: you get a call from be it ICE or any
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  Speaker 2: other federal agency that says, hey, can you run a
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  Speaker 2: search for me? And either because they believe in the
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  Speaker 2: cause that that federal agency is pursuing or they just
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  Speaker 2: they want to be on good terms with them. Because
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  Speaker 2: they may need something from them tomorrow, they say, happy
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  Speaker 2: to help. And Flock never acknowledges that no security procedures
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  Speaker 2: it's put in place do anything to protect against the
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  Speaker 2: misuse of its system. The question becomes how do we
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  Speaker 2: close that loophole? You ban them, sir. You ban them.
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  Speaker 3: Thank you.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, now we're moving from what happened in the hearing
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  Speaker 1: to Kevin Stone's opinion of what happened in the hearing.
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  Speaker 1: And I want that distinction crystal clear. My first thought was,
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  Speaker 1: why are we suddenly specifically talking about ICE? We've got
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  Speaker 1: this surprisingly bipartisan hearing about surveillance and the Fourth Amendment,
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  Speaker 1: and now ICE enters the conversation. Considering the ongoing political
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  Speaker 1: fights between Democrats and President Donald Trump over immigration enforcement
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  Speaker 1: and ICE, my political radar went off. My reaction was,
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  Speaker 1: are we fishing here? Are we looking for a way
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  Speaker 1: to connect this issue back to ICE and ultimately point
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  Speaker 1: a finger at Donald Trump? That's what crossed my mind.
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  Speaker 1: Can I prove that's why Senator Padilla asked those questions? No.
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  Speaker 1: And I'm not going to tell you his motives when
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  Speaker 1: I don't know his motives. That's my opinion. You just
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  Speaker 1: heard the exchange. You decide what you think about it.
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  Speaker 1: And to be fair to Senator Padilla, underneath the politics
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  Speaker 1: is still a legitimate question. Who can access this information?
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  Speaker 1: If Flock says one agency doesn't directly have access, can
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  Speaker 1: information still reach that agency through other law enforcement organizations?
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  Speaker 1: That question matters regardless of whether the agency involved is ICE,
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  Speaker 1: the FBI, the Arkansas State Police, your local sheriff, or
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  Speaker 1: anybody else. Because once again, we're back to the Fourth
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  Speaker 1: Amendment and limits on government surveillance. So where does all
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  Speaker 1: this leave me? I'm not standing here saying rip down
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  Speaker 1: every flock camera in America. That's not what I've learned
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  Speaker 1: from this. I'm saying my original position was wrong. If
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  Speaker 1: you don't have anything to hide, you don't have anything
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  Speaker 1: to worry about. No, I don't believe that anymore. Because
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  Speaker 1: privacy isn't about hiding criminal activity. It's about having boundaries
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  Speaker 1: on government power. And Lindsay Isaac's testimony put a human
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  Speaker 1: face on something I hadn't taken seriously enough. That doesn't
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  Speaker 1: mean flock technology can't help police. It clearly can. The
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  Speaker 1: question is what rules surround it? Who can search it?
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  Speaker 1: Why can they search it? And how long is the
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  Speaker 1: information stored? Who can that information be shared with? What
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  Speaker 1: safeguards prevent abuse? And what verification should happen before information
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  Speaker 1: from one of these cameras contributes to taking away somebody's freedom?
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  Speaker 1: Those are questions worth answering. And maybe my stupid coffee
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  Speaker 1: mug gets the final word on this one. I don't
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  Speaker 1: know what I'm talking about. Sometimes I don't. Neither do you.
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  Speaker 1: None of us know everything. But here's what matters. When
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  Speaker 1: better information becomes available, are we willing to listen to it?
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  Speaker 1: Because being wrong isn't the problem. Being shown you're wrong
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  Speaker 1: and refusing to admit it because you've already picked your side,
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  Speaker 1: that's a problem. I thought, if you ain't got nothing
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  Speaker 1: to hide, you ain't got nothing to worry about. Then
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  Speaker 1: I did more homework. Then I listened to Lindsay Isaacs.
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  Speaker 1: I listened to a sheriff. I listened to Republicans. I
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  Speaker 1: listened to Democrats. And I changed my mind. Apparently that
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  Speaker 1: coffee mug knows me better than I thought. I'm Kevin Stone.
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  Speaker 1: This is the Kevin Stone Podcast. Keep asking questions, and
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  Speaker 1: I'll talk to you next time. You can also find
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  Speaker 1: the Kevin Stone Podcast on Apple Podcasts, iHeartRadio, Amazon Music, Spotify,
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  Speaker 1: and Spreaker.
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  Speaker 3: This concludes our broadcast day. Good night, and God bless America.