Lowe’s Home Improvement gets shunned in home state over contract with notorious surveillance vendor, Flock

Wilmington, NC — As a part of the national NoALPRs week of action, protesters gathered today outside of the Lowe’s in Wilmington, NC to call out the company’s use of Flock license plate surveillance technology in parking lots. The action in the home state of Lowe’s Corporate HQ (in Mooresville, NC) highlights how public attitudes against surveillance have expanded across the country. Since last year, over 130 cities have paused or terminated their contracts with Flock, according to the privacy non-profit Secure Justice, and public pressure even pushed Amazon Ring to reverse its partnership earlier this year.

Wilmington joins several other cities in raising awareness and voicing concern over Lowe’s troubling collaboration with Flock. Similar protests have taken place or are scheduled in New Mexico, Virginia, Oregon, Texas and California throughout the month of August.

These protests are being held as pressure mounts against Flock from civil society, shareholders, and lawmakers alike. Lowe’s has received heat from state lawmakers in Connecticut, as well as Members of Congress who sent an oversight letter to both Lowe’s and Home Depot, demanding answers to questions about their license plate readers. In the spring, 40 civil rights and privacy organizations sent a letter to Lowe’s demanding the company drop its Flock partnership, and shareholders brought forward a proposal to interrogate the company’s surveillance practices.

Check out photos of actions at Lowe’s locations from all across the country:

Deflock organizers issued the following statements regarding the Lowe’s Flock contract: 

Reem Suleiman, Campaign Director of Fight For the Future said:

“For too long, Lowe’s has ignored public calls for transparency and accountability over their participation in Flock’s surveillance network. These grassroots actions demonstrate that people really are against ubiquitous surveillance cameras like Flock being able to track them everywhere they go.”

Joaquin from New Mexico Deflock said:

“I believe we, as a society, have created an over-acceptance of technology for the sake of “progress and safety”. ALPRs are being strewn around towns and cities in the name of capitalism and profit, without any respect towards human dignity nor the rights the Framers fought for us to have. No one should have to live in fear of their info or data stolen or used nefariously and potentially imprison those the system is designed to target. Each time a camera goes up, more of our rights are chipped away. It is beyond time to remove these cameras

Mark Spencer Williams, founder, DeFlockILM.org said:

“Lowe’s has every right to put a camera on its own property. That has never been my objection. My objection is what happened next. A state agency asked Lowe’s for access to its customers’ movements, and Lowe’s said yes — no warrant, no court order, no notice to a single shopper. The camera is not the problem. The open door to it is.”

###