To our 1,270+ signers —
Last month we told you New Hanover County's Flock contract appears broader than state law allows. Now we have the County's own audit records — and they show the scale of it.
THE NUMBERS ARE IN
Through a public records request, we obtained the search logs for New Hanover County's Flock network. Between January 23, 2025 and June 5, 2026 — about sixteen months — 2,980,082 searches ran through the County's cameras. That is roughly 6,000 searches every single day, and at the peak last spring, close to 400,000 in a single month. Each search reached a median of 6,177 other camera networks across the country at once. And this was people running queries, not machines: more than 99% of the searches were typed by a user.
AND NO ONE WILL SAY WHO
The County blacked out every agency name and every officer name in the logs. We also asked for the list of the agencies it shares this data with, and receives it from — and we did not get it. So nearly three million searches touched the records of drivers in our community, and the public cannot see who ran a single one, or whether any of them came with the written request the law requires.
THE CONTRACT STILL POINTS THE WRONG WAY
As we reported, New Hanover's $219,000 contract lets Flock disclose the footage to "government officials, and/or third parties" on its own "good faith belief" — a standard found nowhere in North Carolina's ALPR law, which allows this data to be disclosed only to a law-enforcement officer, for a legitimate law-enforcement purpose, on a written request, and never by sale. No North Carolina court has yet decided whether a standing, always-on network like this can be squared with that law. We are not alleging a crime — the redactions make proof impossible. We are saying a surveillance network this large should not operate without a single name attached to it.
THIS IS STILL NEW HANOVER'S FIGHT
The Board of Commissioners approved this network, funds it, and can end it. Orange County said no. Hillsborough said no. Chatham County said no. New Hanover County can too.
SHOW UP
Three minutes at a public meeting is more pressure than any online petition. You do not need to be an attorney. You need to be a constituent.
- Email your commissioners now: deflockilm.org/email-your-leaders
- Willing to speak at a meeting — or just show up and be counted? Reach us at deflockilm.org and we'll send the schedule and everything you need.
- Read the full records and our complete analysis yourself at deflockilm.org.
Six thousand searches a day. No name attached to any of them. That is not public safety with accountability — that is surveillance without a witness.
Your privacy. Your community. Your move.
DeFlockILM | Wilmington, NC | deflockilm.org | change.org/DeFlockILM