A report detailing survey results of police departments’ use of Automatic License Plate Recognition (ALPR) cameras — popularly called “Flock cameras” — has been released by the Virginia State Crime Commission, exploring the extent to which departments are meeting new requirements passed by the General Assembly governing the technology.

It’s the second time the survey has been conducted and was completed in August 2026. The first survey conducted in 2025 suffered from a low response rate. According to the report, “nearly one-third of law enforcement agencies did not respond” to the first survey. The August survey had a 98 percent response rate, representing 351 out of 359 law enforcement agencies. The report notes that the results may not be up-to-date because since August at least 47 localities have ended, suspended, paused, or re-evaluated their use of ALPRs.

How Effective Is Virginia’s Legislation?

In total, 25 states have enacted legislation governing the use of Flock cameras by law enforcement agencies.

The Policing Project, run by the New York University School of Law, has produced a scorecard rating each state’s legislation against a model statute the Policing Project proposed. The model statute covers seven areas:

• Privacy
• False positives
• Data sharing
• Policing protests
• Auditing
• Transparency
• Enforcement

No state had laws in place to address all seven proposed statutes, but four states had laws covering six of the seven. Virginia, along with Connecticut, Oregon, and Washington earned that distinction.

Virginia’s legislation fell short on the issue of data sharing because it doesn’t “establish a formal data sharing process to ensure that all sharing of ALPR data is authorized, lawful, and documented in writing.”

Neighboring states Maryland and North Carolina each have legislation addressing just three of the seven areas.

What Did Virginia’s Survey Show?

Compared with the 2025 survey, “far fewer agencies reported non-compliance” in four key areas:

• 6 agencies reported not having a policy
• 7 agencies reported data retention periods over 21 days
• 1 agency reported continuously sharing ALPR system data with federal law enforcement
  agencies, however, that agency is no longer using an ALPR system; and
• 4 agencies reported continuously sharing ALPR system data with other state law
  enforcement agencies.

All totaled, there have been seven charges filed in two Virginia general district courts related to misuse of Flock cameras. The charges were filed in James City County and Chesterfield County.

ALPR Use by Type of Agency

How the cameras are managed and used varies significantly:

• The report finds that 35 percent (66 or 191) of agencies are authorized to access another law enforcement agency’s ALPR system.
• Of the 191 agencies with cameras, 178 report having a policy, but fully one-third of agencies do not publicly publish their policies.

Vandalism Is a Problem

As public concerns over the use of Flock cameras has risen, vandalism of Flock cameras is becoming a problem. Of the 191 agencies in Virginia using Flock cameras, 52 (27 percent) reported incidents of vandalism.

The types of vandalism varied significantly, with the report finding APLR’s “being spray painted, covered with stickers or plastic bags, unplugged and/or cut power cables, stolen from light poles, cut down, hit purposefully by vehicles, turned away from the roadway, set
on fire, or shot.”

Some Agencies Are Linking Flock Cameras to Other Technologies

The vast majority of agencies (73 percent) using Flock use it as a stand-alone technology. However, 26 percent are integrating Flock with other technologies. The two most common are video recording technology, and real-time crime center technology.

Who Can Access ALPR Data Varies by District?

In nearly half of law enforcement agencies using Flock, all sworn law enforcement officers are allowed to conduct ALPR searches.

What Crimes Are Flock Used to Help Solve?

There is a wide ranges of cases that Flock cameras are reportedly used. The two most-common crimes in which Flock is used are motor vehicle theft and larceny. No agencies reported using the cameras for civil immigration cases. Other uses include:

The full report is available here.