Lee Schmidt, a retired veteran, wanted to know more about the license plate cameras tracking him in Norfolk, Virginia, where he lives.
So he sued with a co-plaintiff and a legal nonprofit and got an answer: 176 cameras across the city logged his location 526 times between Feb. 19 and July 2, according to a Monday court filing. That’s about four times per day.
“It’s a crazy high number. It was shocking,” Schmidt told NBC News. “The creepiness level just went straight up.”The cameras are operated by Flock Safety, a company that has grown swiftly in recent years and now bills itself as “the largest public-private safety network” in the country. Founded in 2017, Flock offers a wide range of data-generating surveillance equipment, including drones, audio gunshot detectors and body-worn video cameras for police officers, which can then be combined with the company’s software products that include everything from searchable databases to real-time maps…