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past and present
Flock's business model turned out to be very lucrative. Valued at $8.4 billion in 2026,<ref>https://whoistheownerof.com/who-owns-flock-safety-complete-ownership/</ref> Flock was drawing in customers from all across the US.<ref>https://whoistheownerof.com/who-owns-flock-safety-complete-ownership/</ref> Seeing this wealth, numerous other companies soon joined the market, competing with Flock. [[Axon Enterprise|Axon]], [[Rekor Systems|Rekor]], [[Genetec]], [[Leonardo ELSAG|Leonardo]], and even [[Motorola Solutions]] have developed competing systems of networked ALPRs, forming mass surveillance grids.
Flock's business model turned out to be very lucrative. Valued at $8.4 billion in 2026,<ref>https://whoistheownerof.com/who-owns-flock-safety-complete-ownership/</ref> Flock was drawing in customers from all across the US.<ref>https://whoistheownerof.com/who-owns-flock-safety-complete-ownership/</ref> Seeing this wealth, numerous other companies soon joined the market, competing with Flock. [[Axon Enterprise|Axon]], [[Rekor Systems|Rekor]], [[Genetec]], [[Leonardo ELSAG|Leonardo]], and even [[Motorola Solutions]] have developed competing systems of networked ALPRs, forming mass surveillance grids.
==Mass surveillance market==
From the perspective of mass surveillance, under the belief that the government should know nearly everything about every person, Flock and its competitors came at the right time. While government officials has previously been tracking people's movements (without search warrants) using GPS trackers, the courts put a stop to that. In the case of Jones v United States, the courts ruled that tracking a person requires a search warrant, which specifies the subject to be tracked, and the period of time when the tracking will occur.<ref>https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/10-1259</ref> However, cell phones had become commonplace then, so officials began tracking citizens using cell phone data without warrants, instead. However, once again, the courts put a stop to this, in the case of Carpenter v. United States.<ref>https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/585/16-402/</ref> They ruled again, that tracking a person's movements over time, using cell phone tracing, requires a search warrant. But just a year before this ruling, Flock had been founded, presenting officials with a new method of tracking people. Under the claim that "ALPRs are not illegal" and "this doesn't count as tracking," government agencies began signing on with Flock, in order to track the movements of citizens. The underlying purpose, tracking peoples' movements over time without search warrants, is illegal under the [[Fourth Amendment]]. However, the courts have not yet gotten the opportunity to rule specifically on the technology which Flock Safety is using, so this is being called legal by way of that loophole.
==References==
==References==