Redmond Police Department to disable Flock automated license plate readers for the time being

Redmond has taken an initial step towards ridding itself of the intrusive automated license plate reader system that the city recently paid a controversial vendor called Flock Safety to install. At a special meeting of the Redmond City Council tonight, after each of the seven councilmembers voiced their desire to disable the system, Police Chief Darrell Lowe stepped to the podium and publicly committed to turning off access for his officers by morning. While the Council still needs to follow up and formally terminate the contract, and while the equipment still needs to be physically disconnected and removed, this is a promising first development that we at NPI are encouraged to see.

This morning, after our own Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon published disturbing new information about Flock Safety’s poor cybersecurity hygiene and bad business practices, we sent an open letter to the Redmond City Council and Mayor Angela Birney requesting the swift decommissioning of the Flock Safety system in our hometown. We noted in that letter that many other communities around the country have realized that signing up with Flock was a mistake, and that Redmond needs to do likewise.

The Council heard public comment tonight that echoed and reinforced our comments. Councilmember Steve Fields then reported on our letter, confirming receipt.

After all items from the audience were concluded, the Council discussed the Flock cameras as well as the news that ICE was in Redmond today detaining people. Chief Lowe confirmed that several individuals were seized by ICE personnel and that the City of Redmond was not given any advance warning that ICE would be conducting operations within the city. One individual was taken at Panera Bread, which is located in the Bear Creek shopping center. Another was taken at the Redmond Home Depot.

https://www.nwprogressive.org/weblog/2025/11/a-preliminary-victory-for-privacy-redmond-police-department-to-disable-flock-automated-license-plate-readers-for-the-time-being.html