Flock Has a Powerful New AI Tool for Police. We Got Its Code

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Flock Safety, whose surveillance cameras are deployed across 6,000+ communities, has built a next-generation AI system called OS Investigate (formerly Nightshift) that fundamentally inverts its original model. WIRED found 450+ code files on Flock's own website describing 45 AI tools with access to plate scans, arrest records, 911 dispatch logs, ballistics results, and commercial databases containing Social Security numbers, dates of birth, phone numbers, relatives, and associates.\n\nThe system's 69 prewritten prompts enable officers to surface potential witnesses by how often their vehicles pass a neighborhood, identify 'associates' from shared camera passages, and search for individuals in a geofenced area based solely on a physical description — without a known plate, name, or prior crime. This inverts the original transactional model: instead of checking known vehicles against watchlists, the tool surfaces unknown people from behavioral patterns alone.\n\nFlock says the tool is in testing with a small law enforcement group. But privacy and legal experts quoted by WIRED say the system already raises serious Fourth Amendment concerns by enabling broad, often warrantless access to mass movement records. The company simultaneously faces bipartisan political pressure, documented officer misuse, and physical vandalism of its cameras in cities across the US.