> Can anyone rationally explain why a police agency that is interested in Flock would like to see one third-party camera integration that is in a children’s gymnastics room?
The cops stood outside Uvalde. There was an army of police and they stood outside. There is no duty to protect in the US.
PunchyHamster 25 minutes ago [-]
At what current govt is doing the assumption it's for the pedophiles is far more likely.
Companies push not only age verification (in way that usually is not anonymous) and cameras everywhere will give any pedophile with access to that location of any child they can get their hands of, their daily habits and when it's easiest to nab one of them.
They are creating Pedo Nexus, whether knowingly or not.
You don't need 24/7, online, searchable, AI enabled video feed to stop any of that
goldenarm 2 hours ago [-]
Why is this site blocked in the EU ? Was disabling cookies on your static page that hard ?
1970-01-01 2 hours ago [-]
You're not missing anything. Here is the full text: (this could have been an email:)
On Sept. 30, 2025, a Flock vice president logged into the Dunwoody PD’s Flock system and looked at a camera in the children’s gymnastics room of a private community center here in Dunwoody.
He did not look at any other cameras in the entire 400-camera network that day.
The community center shared their cameras directly to the PD under the pretense that access was “solely for real-time critical incident response.”
Flock and Dunwoody elected officials both say this was for a “sales demo.” They claim this was “part of authorized activity approved under the city's demo partner agreement.”
The problem with that is that the city cannot provide any information that that demo partner agreement exists.
What kind of sales demo would require looking at one camera in a children’s gymnastics room? Can anyone rationally explain why a police agency that is interested in Flock would like to see one third-party camera integration that is in a children’s gymnastics room?
Jason Hunyar lives in Dunwoody.
sterlind 5 minutes ago [-]
why are private community centers installing Flock cameras indoors?
actionfromafar 2 hours ago [-]
[flagged]
arjie 2 hours ago [-]
No one is going to go around complying with random rules from other countries, man. If you don't serve that population, just opt them out.
nilslindemann 14 minutes ago [-]
In German Criminal Code (https://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/englisch_stgb/index.html) those "random rules" are for example Section 111, Public incitement to commit offences, Section 126a, Dangerous dissemination of personal data, and Section 238, Stalking. They apply to the last sentence: "Jason Hunyar lives in Dunwoody". Without that last sentence it would probably be no problem to publish it somewhere.
goldenarm 41 minutes ago [-]
They complied by building a blocking system, instead of just disabling cookies with a flag, which would have taken exactly the same effort.
mandevil 25 minutes ago [-]
This would be true if they were working from a baremetal Apache server. But they seem to be using a vendor, Cloudflare, for their CDN. And so I strongly suspect that they used their existing Cloudflare account to do it. Just type the countries you want to block into a field in the Cloudflare UI and you're done. I've used that UI myself (not for GPDR reasons but for compliance with my countries sanctions). Significantly easier than controlling the cookies and data retention and getting an audit to certify compliance, which I've also done.
Jtarii 1 hours ago [-]
And by "no one" you mean almost everyone.
2 hours ago [-]
urbandw311er 2 hours ago [-]
Except that it’s an entire continent and loads of people do comply with it. You just sound ignorant.
baby_souffle 46 minutes ago [-]
I've been in meetings where this was discussed.
"It's just a checkbox in cloudflare to not show up there" is so effortless that you need a compelling reason to ignore how easy it is.
And if you don't already have traffic analysis showing that 30% of your readers and thus 30% of your ad revenue is coming from the European continent... You spend the 45 seconds it takes to find the check box and you click. Then worrying about maybe possibly getting screwed by some far away legal something or other is irrelevant.
manytimesaway 2 hours ago [-]
So we're supposed to deal with your bullshit Patriot Act while GDPR is too "random" for you?
dghlsakjg 2 hours ago [-]
They are a hyper local business. The chance of making any revenue off EU users is close to 0, which is much higher than the cost of figuring out EU compliance.
The conversation went like this:
IT director: “If we serve ads or collect data from EU users we have to be GDPR compliant. That’ll cost several thousand dollars worth of employee time”
Exec: “how much revenue is attributable to EU users.”
IT: “Single digit dollars per year”
Exec: “is there a cheaper solution?”
2 hours ago [-]
mywittyname 1 hours ago [-]
GDPR compliance is good IT practice. It's easy to do, good for users, and states are rolling out similar laws.
But now, instead of their story being read by people all over the world, having gone viral, it's just going to pirated. Not only losing them out on revenue, but recognition as well.
This is part of the long death of online local news. They can't be bothered to do the simplest things for their site (make personal data collection optional). But they have tons of time to fill them with online cancer and make them unusable without ad blocking.
compiler-guy 27 minutes ago [-]
"We might, maybe, have some article go viral some day. With unknown revenue implications." is a weak argument for trying to figure out and maintain GDPR compliance, which costs real money right now, today. And you have to be sure to maintain that compliance as the web site evolves.
It's such a low-probability event that I don't blame them for just saying, "Nah. Not gonna hassle with that."
The recognition argument is also quite weak--it's not like recognition pays the bills.
advisedwang 2 hours ago [-]
This website is a small, local company. They have a newsletter signup page so they do collect user info. Quite likely they are not GDPR compliant (e.g. take longer than 30d to delete records, don't have a process for answering data requests etc). It is reasonable for them not to want to invest in getting the legal advise to know whether they are compliant or process improvements to become compliant, as there is no ROI on that.
I love GDPR, but it's understandable for folks with no connection to the EU to just nope-out.
jazzyjackson 2 hours ago [-]
I’m still not clear why US companies with no business units in Europe feel the need to make any changes at all to be in compliance with a law that has no jurisdiction over them, but agree that Geofencing is a cheaper solution than asking a lawyer.
devilbunny 2 hours ago [-]
Because they have identifiable owners who might wish to travel to Europe and not risk someone deciding to make an example of them.
boc 1 hours ago [-]
You're making the point even stronger for US companies to just block EU traffic entirely. If you have no EU customers, the mere act of letting EU visitors on your site might cause an EU country to "make an example" of you for incorrect data handling, but the alternative of just blocking all traffic would let you travel to the EU without issues.
jazzyjackson 15 minutes ago [-]
Well, my point was that a site owner shouldn’t even bother with geofencing, but I guess I’ll accept “may want to travel to europe someday” as a reason to fear legal repercussions
ipsento606 19 minutes ago [-]
the idea of the owners of a small, regional US news website being arrested while traveling in Europe because that site does not have a GDPR compliant cookie policy seems utterly detached from reality
I would be more worried about being struck by a meteorite than such a thing
jdlshore 2 hours ago [-]
The GDPR states that websites that serve EU citizens are subject to it, no matter where they are. Many US news organizations chose to geo-block the EU rather than going to the trouble of figuring out compliance.
TurdF3rguson 1 hours ago [-]
Yes but it means serve them specifically. If the main audience is US and some EU visitors happen by, it's not violation. Or at least it's not enforceable violation.
baby_souffle 43 minutes ago [-]
And that might even be true. But it's still at least an hour of retained council's time to deal with it. It's not even 90 seconds to find the geo filter button in your CDN of choice and save you the trouble entirely.
jazzyjackson 2 hours ago [-]
The GDPR can state whatever it wants but what are the consequences? If the taliban pass a law about what is required to serve websites in Afghanistan, for instance, what obligation am I under to even notice?
If I am Reuters and AP and have offices in EU of course I am interested in complying with local law, but it doesn’t make sense to me for a local newspaper to care whether they are in compliance with foreign statutes.
godwinson__4-8 2 hours ago [-]
Westerners don't travel to Afghanistan. Europe is not a pariah continent. Does this really need to be explained to you? You think global integration with Europe vs Afghanistan is comparable?
jazzyjackson 14 minutes ago [-]
Obviously an extreme comparison to make a point because either way it’s not going to result in me being extradited
Still I will maintain that individuals are not going to face repercussions on vacation because they happen to manage a web property out of compliance with GDPR
2 hours ago [-]
krater23 1 hours ago [-]
This website and topic is protected by a SEP field. Who cares about U.S. problems?
wxw 2 hours ago [-]
Is there more information available? This article is effectively one sentence long:
> On Sept. 30, 2025, a Flock vice president logged into the Dunwoody PD’s Flock system and looked at a camera in the children’s gymnastics room of a private community center here in Dunwoody.
And there is a lot being implied in this sentence.
Flock is such a scummy company. One must just read a bit of the coverage from 404 Media [1] or Benn Jordan [2] and get a whiff of how this company is handling pretty legitimate criticism about privacy and basic device security.
I could think of one reason
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Columbine_High_School_massacre
Companies push not only age verification (in way that usually is not anonymous) and cameras everywhere will give any pedophile with access to that location of any child they can get their hands of, their daily habits and when it's easiest to nab one of them.
They are creating Pedo Nexus, whether knowingly or not.
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Columbine_High_School_massacre
You don't need 24/7, online, searchable, AI enabled video feed to stop any of that
On Sept. 30, 2025, a Flock vice president logged into the Dunwoody PD’s Flock system and looked at a camera in the children’s gymnastics room of a private community center here in Dunwoody.
He did not look at any other cameras in the entire 400-camera network that day.
The community center shared their cameras directly to the PD under the pretense that access was “solely for real-time critical incident response.”
Flock and Dunwoody elected officials both say this was for a “sales demo.” They claim this was “part of authorized activity approved under the city's demo partner agreement.”
The problem with that is that the city cannot provide any information that that demo partner agreement exists.
What kind of sales demo would require looking at one camera in a children’s gymnastics room? Can anyone rationally explain why a police agency that is interested in Flock would like to see one third-party camera integration that is in a children’s gymnastics room?
Jason Hunyar lives in Dunwoody.
"It's just a checkbox in cloudflare to not show up there" is so effortless that you need a compelling reason to ignore how easy it is.
And if you don't already have traffic analysis showing that 30% of your readers and thus 30% of your ad revenue is coming from the European continent... You spend the 45 seconds it takes to find the check box and you click. Then worrying about maybe possibly getting screwed by some far away legal something or other is irrelevant.
The conversation went like this:
IT director: “If we serve ads or collect data from EU users we have to be GDPR compliant. That’ll cost several thousand dollars worth of employee time”
Exec: “how much revenue is attributable to EU users.”
IT: “Single digit dollars per year”
Exec: “is there a cheaper solution?”
But now, instead of their story being read by people all over the world, having gone viral, it's just going to pirated. Not only losing them out on revenue, but recognition as well.
This is part of the long death of online local news. They can't be bothered to do the simplest things for their site (make personal data collection optional). But they have tons of time to fill them with online cancer and make them unusable without ad blocking.
It's such a low-probability event that I don't blame them for just saying, "Nah. Not gonna hassle with that."
The recognition argument is also quite weak--it's not like recognition pays the bills.
I love GDPR, but it's understandable for folks with no connection to the EU to just nope-out.
I would be more worried about being struck by a meteorite than such a thing
If I am Reuters and AP and have offices in EU of course I am interested in complying with local law, but it doesn’t make sense to me for a local newspaper to care whether they are in compliance with foreign statutes.
Still I will maintain that individuals are not going to face repercussions on vacation because they happen to manage a web property out of compliance with GDPR
> On Sept. 30, 2025, a Flock vice president logged into the Dunwoody PD’s Flock system and looked at a camera in the children’s gymnastics room of a private community center here in Dunwoody.
And there is a lot being implied in this sentence.
1. https://www.404media.co/city-learns-flock-accessed-cameras-i...
3. https://www.techdirt.com/2026/05/05/flocks-sales-pitch-inclu... -- commenting on the 404 Media article
2. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47784045
[1] https://www.404media.co/tag/flock/
[2] https://www.youtube.com/@BennJordan/search?query=flock