Johnson City police restrict Flock searches, disable out-of-state lookup amid calls to drop system

First reported: September 24, 2026 · 1 source

The Johnson City Police Department has adopted internal restrictions on its Flock Safety network, which Deputy Chief Mike Adams said includes 145 automated license plate readers and 83 pan-tilt-zoom cameras. According to Adams, the changes made since the prior month remove patrol officers' ability to run searches, narrow the permissible reasons for a search, and disable the "Nationwide Lookup" feature that let out-of-state agencies search the department's network directly. The changes come as some residents have called on JCPD to stop using Flock entirely, and after a reported breach in which a hacker group said it extracted 1.6 million photos covering more than 50,000 vehicles from a single camera.

Why this matters

Johnson City's move shows a department narrowing access voluntarily rather than by ordinance or state law, which leaves the limits subject to change at the agency's discretion and offers other communities a model to compare against binding policy.

Key facts

JCPD operates 145 ALPRs and 83 PTZ cameras through Flock Safety.
New internal limits bar patrol officers from running searches, narrow allowed search reasons, and disable out-of-state "Nationwide Lookup" access.
A city spreadsheet documents more than 90 instances of camera use to locate vehicles and over $300,000 in recovered stolen property, per the report.
A hacker group reported obtaining 1.6 million photos of more than 50,000 vehicles from one Flock camera; retired counterintelligence agent Devin Morgan attributed it to an engineering flaw, and said it did not expose the full network or database.
Deputy Chief Mike Adams described the technology as a valuable investigative tool and said the restrictions were made preemptively ahead of possible legislation.

Sources

This summary was written from the published reporting below and links to it; BlockFlockNow does not reproduce article text.

Johnson City police create new limits on Flock searches amid calls to end their usage (WCYB, September 24, 2026)

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About this record

BlockFlockNow documents reported incidents involving Flock Safety cameras and automated license plate readers: council votes, contract decisions, misuse by authorized users, lawsuits, audits, and community response. Every record is reviewed by a person before publication. New to the topic? Start with What is Flock?, find meetings near you, or learn how to request your town's camera records.

Updated September 25, 2026. Corrections: blockflock@bytebunny.io. See all documented incidents or search the full article archive.