In a Monday report, the San Francisco Human Rights Commission found that the city’s police department did not violate city sanctuary law after out-of-state agencies searched its license plate data, some on behalf of federal immigration authorities.
Nevertheless, the report made five recommendations as to how the police department could tighten oversight of the surveillance cameras.
The San Francisco Police Department runs over 400 AI-powered surveillance cameras, called automated license plate readers, through the controversial private company Flock Safety. With Flock’s powerful search feature, officers can scan through photos of cars taken up to 12 months ago and follow their movement.
But this technology is not only being used by local police. Federal agencies, including Immigration and Customs Enforcement, were able to access data collected from the cameras.
The police department this summer revealed that federal and out-of-state agencies “improperly” accessed city Flock data hundreds of times; the San Francisco Standard had earlier reported 1.6 million such illegal searches between 2024 and 2025.
The Human Rights Commission report, conducted over the course of 10 months and released Monday, addressed whether or not the SFPD violated sanctuary laws by unknowingly sharing license plate data with out-of-state agencies. It concluded that the police did not violate city rules.
The Commission wrote that there was no violation because Flock is a contractor, and a national search feature was turned on by Flock without police department knowledge.
“While the evidence does not support a finding against SFPD … HRC’s investigation shows that SFPD’s contractor allowed city resources to be utilized to arguably assist in enforcement of federal immigration law,” reads the report.
But the report still found problems with the system’s status quo and made five recommendations:
- The department should require officers to document a specific reason for each search and set clearer standards for who can access the data;
- The SFPD should take direct control of Flock’s “Nationwide Lookup” feature, which enables the feds to access local data instead of leaving that setting to the company;
- The SFPD should enable all options on the cameras to bolster public transparency;
- The police should wipe license plate data after 30 days, and;
- The SFPD should hold regular reviews with Flock to stay abreast of changes to the technology.
That final recommendation was especially germane, noted the report, as the SFPD did not initially know that Flock had enabled national searches, allowing the feds to seamlessly access data from San Francisco cameras.
The report also suggested the SFPD consider vendors other than Flock, citing reports that Flock has misrepresented its data-sharing practices.
“Safe and informed use of Flock technologies is essential to maintain constituent trust in enforcement of privacy safeguards related to federal immigration enforcement,” reads the report.
Flock cameras remain popular among city officials. The San Francisco Democratic Party voted overwhelmingly to uphold the city’s use of the cameras, though some candidates for office have pushed for stricter guardrails.
In its initial response to the Human Rights Commission, in January, the police department said it was “shocked and disappointed” to find out that data from its license plate readers was searched by agencies outside California. The search tool is presently disabled, and Chief Derrick Lew said in January no data had been unknowingly shared since mid-February 2025.
But Lew in June told the Police Commission that the department was uncertain if data had been shared through 299 other queries by out-of-state and federal agencies that came through a regional intelligence center between May 2025 and May 2026, according to the report.
The chief of police, for his part, pushed back and stated that the Human Rights Commission overstepped in providing policy recommendations.
Advocates for data security, meanwhile, felt the recommendations were insufficient.
Angela Chan, assistant chief attorney at the San Francisco Public Defenders Office, said Flock has enabled federal immigration authorities to surveil people and help “facilitate mass deportations,” while also showing that “it cannot be trusted with our data.” She said San Francisco should not renew its Flock contract.
Rindala Alajaji, associate director of state affairs at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, agreed: “The issue at hand here is people’s lives.”
