Anti-Flock camera protest in Tiffin

CORRECTION- The story, "Anti-Flock camera protest in Tiffin," that was published in Monday's edition of the Advertiser-Tribune, incorrectly identified two cameras on the corner of 4th Ave. and Wall St. as Flock Safety cameras. Work Connections International, LLC and Wall Street Self Storage, where the cameras were incorrectly identified by deFlock.org, has notified the Advertiser-Tribune that the cameras are not Flock Safety ALPRs. These cameras were purchased by the business. They were not provided by Flock Safety and they are not ALPR cameras. These are basic solar powered outdoor security cameras we use for our storage unit facility. TIFFIN — Two people stood outside the Seneca County Justice Center on Saturday afternoon holding signs reading "Get the Flock Out of Tiffin," protesting the city's use of automated license plate readers made by Flock Safety. The cameras use artificial intelligence to capture and analyze images of every passing vehicle, storing each car's location along with the date and time. They also record a vehicle's make, model and color, plus identifying features such as dents, roof racks and bumper stickers, often turning those details into searchable data points. That data is uploaded to Flock's cloud system, where participating agencies can search and share information across jurisdictions. Seneca County has 12 Flock cameras, according to deflock.org, a website that provides information about the readers and lets users report and track them. Three sit on the county's border. Two are along Seneca County Line Road, one at the intersection with state Route 12 and one east of Green Springs near CR 198. The third is at state Route 53 and CR 58. Tiffin has six. Four are in the parking lot of Lowe's Home Improvement at 1025 W. Market St., and two are near Work Connections International at Fourth Avenue and Wall Street. Three more are placed elsewhere in the county: one along S. CR 47, one at W. TR 112 and U.S. 224 and one at state Route 53 and CR 38. The protest was organized by a Tiffin resident who goes by "The Political Plague Doctor." The organizer spoke to the Advertiser-Tribune but asked to remain anonymous. "Right now I'm just trying to bring awareness to it. I want to make people aware that these cameras are there and they are watching you. Whether you want them to or not, they are watching you," the protester said. The organizer said they are concerned about how law enforcement uses the data Flock collects, citing reporting that officers across the country have used the cameras to stalk and track down former partners. CNN recently reported that a Kentucky police officer was arrested after authorities said he used Flock's system to track his ex-girlfriend more than 2,000 times. "The people that we are supposed to be trusting with this information, the police, are already abusing it for their own personal reasons. So it's something I strongly believe needs to be taken down," the protester said. Another protester said they turned out to push back on the cameras' use in Seneca County. "This is not the future I imagined for our younger generation, and nobody else seems to want to do it," they said. "I came here today to, hopefully, encourage other people who feel the same way to come out here and fight against the usage of these cameras." The technology has also surfaced in this year's race for governor, where both major-party candidates have taken critical stances on it. A spokesperson for Democrat Amy Acton, Addie Bullock, said in an Aug. 26 statement that Acton would push for strict guardrails around the technology as governor and work to prevent the abuse of AI surveillance. "Dr. Acton's number one priority is keeping Ohioans safe, but it cannot come at the expense of our First Amendment rights," Bullock said. Republican Vivek Ramaswamy said at the Butler County Fair that he does not want an authoritarian surveillance state that threatens the country's founding freedoms on the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.