Community Cheat Sheet
A two-page reference card covering our position, how to respond to common arguments, who is behind Flock Safety, what their own patent reveals, and the Flock Nova platform. Print it out and bring it to city council meetings, neighborhood meetups, or any conversation about surveillance in Corona.
Covers: Common talking points and rebuttals · Flock investor network (a16z, Peter Thiel, Founders Fund) · Patent US11416545B1 and what it actually describes · Flock Nova "Google-like search" platform · Links to primary sources.
Flock's Own Patent
Flock Safety markets itself as a simple license plate reader. Their own 2022 patent — US11416545B1 — tells a very different story. The patent describes a "System and Method for Object Based Query of Video Content Captured by a Dynamic Surveillance Network" that uses neural networks to identify and classify people by race, gender, height, weight, and clothing. This data is stored in searchable databases queryable across the entire national network — without a warrant.
Figure 5A of the patent specifically shows the neural network's object classification architecture — not just plates and vehicles, but humans, animals, and physical attributes. This is the diagram Flock does not include in their sales brochures or city council presentations.
What this means for Corona: The hardware already deployed on Corona's streets is capable of far more than reading license plates. These capabilities can be unlocked via a software update — no new cameras required. No Corona ordinance currently prohibits this expansion. Residents approved nothing of the sort.
Flock Nova Platform
Flock Nova is the company's "public safety data platform" — already in active use by law enforcement as of May 2025. Nova combines ALPR data with jail records, arrest records, public records, and OSINT into a single searchable interface. In Flock's own words, it provides a "Google-like search experience" — type a name, plate, phone number, or address and instantly pull everything connected across jurisdictions. No warrant. No judge. No oversight.
After 404 Media broke the story, Flock removed the commercial data broker and data-breach components from Nova. They kept everything else. The EFF described it as a "dystopian panopticon." The ACLU called it "authoritarian tracking infrastructure."
What this means for Corona: Every Corona Flock camera is already part of the network Nova searches. No city opt-in is required. Your plate data — every trip, every timestamp — can become part of a cross-jurisdictional dossier assembled without any judicial oversight. No Corona policy currently prohibits this.
Who's Behind Flock
Flock Safety is a $7.5 billion company with over 100,000 cameras in 49 states, scanning more than 20 billion vehicles per month. Understanding who owns and funds Flock is essential to understanding its agenda.
Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) is the primary investor in Flock. Co-founder Marc Andreessen has publicly stated: "Democracy is fake." This is the firm writing the checks that put cameras on every road into and out of Corona.
Peter Thiel / Founders Fund invested in Flock's $275 million funding round. Thiel co-founded Palantir — the government data-analytics firm holding contracts with ICE, the NSA, and the Department of Defense. Flock data feeds directly into Palantir's platform. The connection between your daily commute and federal surveillance infrastructure runs directly through Thiel's investment portfolio.
These are not passive financial backers. They are ideologically motivated actors who have built a vertically integrated surveillance ecosystem — cameras on the street, data in the cloud, analytics for the feds — and Corona is paying a subscription fee to be part of it.
California Cases
A former Costa Mesa police officer pleaded guilty to using Flock Safety license plate readers to track his wife, mistress, and romantic rivals. Robert Jay Josett, 35, was convicted of three misdemeanors including unauthorized computer access and fraud, and was sentenced to three years of formal probation and a 52-week domestic violence program.
The case is particularly damning for oversight advocates: despite being placed on administrative leave in December 2023, Josett allegedly continued using Flock cameras to locate his mistress's new boyfriend's address as late as June 2024 — six months after he was removed from active duty. His access was never revoked.
Why this matters for Corona: Our own CPRA documents show that in November 2023 — the same month Josett was placed on leave in Costa Mesa — Flock Safety notified the Corona Police Department that up to 203 users had active system access despite not logging in for six months. Corona discovered this only because Flock flagged it, not through any internal audit. The city has no documented evidence of ever auditing who holds active credentials to its Flock network. The Josett case shows exactly what that gap can enable.
The Orange County District Attorney stated: "No one should have to live in fear of being tracked through law enforcement databases by someone with a badge and a gun."
The San Francisco Police Department allowed out-of-state police agencies to conduct over 1.6 million searches of its Flock Safety license plate reader database. Public records reviewed by 404 Media showed the SFPD's data was searched at least 19 times specifically for "ICE Fugitive," "Assist ICE," or specific ICE detention case numbers.
The agencies making these searches included the Franklin County Sheriff's Office in Georgia, the Dallas Police Department, and the California Highway Patrol. This occurred despite San Francisco's status as a sanctuary city — where local law enforcement is explicitly restricted from cooperating with federal immigration authorities.
Why this matters for Corona: This demonstrates that even cities with explicit sanctuary protections had their Flock data used for immigration enforcement through the "national network" feature. Corona has no such protections, and no published policy preventing the same from happening here.