Every day, police departments across Wisconsin are tracking where you go, when you leave, and who you meet — without a warrant, without probable cause, and without your knowledge.

Automated license plate reader cameras, sold by a company called Flock Safety, do far more than read plates. They log the make, model, color, and condition of your vehicle — what Flock calls a "vehicle footprint." When combined with facial recognition tools and commercial data services like Babel Street, law enforcement can assemble a detailed picture of your daily life: your routines, your relationships, your movements.

All of it collected on ordinary residents who have done nothing wrong.

This kind of mass surveillance was developed for use in war zones and colonial contexts. It has no place being used on Wisconsin residents. Research consistently shows that over-policing does not make communities safer, it damages trust between residents and police, concentrates harm in Black and Latino neighborhoods, and treats surveillance as a substitute for addressing the real causes of crime: poverty, economic exclusion, and lack of opportunity.

The federal government has already demonstrated that it accesses and exploits local surveillance data. What Wisconsin police collect today can be used by federal authorities tomorrow.

Sign this petition to demand Wisconsin lawmakers ban Flock cameras and any other automated surveillance technology that tracks residents without a warrant. Our privacy, our communities, and our democracy depend on it.