Syracuse Mayor Ben Walsh signed a 2023 contract with surveillance company Flock Safety granting the company perpetual rights to use "anonymized" city data from license plate readers, despite explicit recommendations against this from his own Surveillance Technology Working Group.

The contract allows Flock to use the anonymized data to improve its products and train machine algorithms, though experts question whether the data can be truly anonymized and city councilors are now seeking to terminate the agreement. Flock maintains its anonymization process is thorough, but concerns persist about data misuse.

Referencing the popular digital “geo-guessing” games—through which individuals have learned how to identify the location of an image based on available details like street signs, roads, vehicle designs and more—Johannes Himmelreich, associate professor of public administration and international affairs, argues that the same may be possible for the data Flock is taking from Syracuse, regardless of the company’s stripping images of their metadata.

“The images that these cameras capture have a lot of information. Even when you anonymize them by throwing away metadata, you can figure out where the image was taken,” Himmelreich says. “After all, you still see the street and everything around the car. So, I doubt that the anonymization is robust. There is a real risk to de-anonymize them.” 

Read more in the Central Current article, “Why Flock will get to keep Syracuse drivers’ ‘anonymized’ data even if lawmakers cancel their contract.”