While Flock Safety’s decision to pause federal law enforcement access to its vast license plate reader network is a welcome step, the Institute for Justice (IJ) dismisses it as a superficial gesture. IJ argues the core problem remains untouched: a massive, privately-operated surveillance system that logs the movements of millions of innocent people without a warrant. The firm contends that federal agencies can still easily access this data indirectly by asking local police partners to run searches. This end-run around the policy change means the fundamental threat to privacy and civil liberties persists. IJ insists that the only real solution is to stop the dragnet data collection altogether, asserting that a person’s daily movements should not be compiled into a searchable database without judicial oversight.