About FlockHopper
FlockHopper is an independent, community-aligned project with one goal: make mass ALPR surveillance visible, and give ordinary people a way to opt their daily drive out of it.
Who runs this?
FlockHopper is built and operated by the developer behind maps.deflock.org, who also helps maintain infrastructure for the DeFlock project, the crowdsourced ALPR-mapping community. The maintainer works under a pseudonym, for the same reason you might not want your license plate in a searchable database.
For help, camera corrections or press, see the support page.
What we collect
Nothing that identifies you. There is no account, so we don’t know who you are. A route request sends your start and end points to our server. The route comes back. Nothing is saved. No analytics, no ad trackers. One exception: if you buy a tip, RevenueCat processes it and keeps an anonymous ID and the purchase record. It never sees where you drive. The privacy policy lists every outside service each app touches.
No accounts, no sign-in
There is no user database because there are no users to store. Nothing ties a route to a person. (Optional tips are the one exception: RevenueCat holds an anonymous purchase record, never linked to anything you do in the app.)
§1No analytics, no tracking SDKs
No cookies, no fingerprinting, no advertising identifiers, no third-party analytics, on the web or in the apps.
§2Routes are never logged
Route requests are processed transiently in memory and discarded. Your origin and destination are never written to disk.
§3Self-hosted infrastructure
Route calculation runs on servers we operate, so your route requests never touch a commercial maps provider.
§4Don't take our word for it. Read the full privacy policy, which documents every third party each platform touches.
Where the camera data comes from
Camera locations come from DeFlock.me and OpenStreetMap: crowdsourced reports, public records, and FOIA requests maintained by volunteers nationwide. The data is public and community-verified; we don't collect it ourselves and we don't independently verify every point. The support page explains how to fix a camera that’s missing or misplaced.
How it's funded
By supporters, through optional in-app extras and tips. That's the whole business model. No ads, no data sales, no investors. Everything you need to see cameras and route around them stays free.
What FlockHopper is not
FlockHopper is an educational and awareness tool. It shows you where publicly documented surveillance cameras are and lets you choose which public roads you drive. It is not designed, intended, or promoted for use in evading law enforcement, and it is not affiliated with Flock Safety, Inc.
FlockHopper protects your drive. Ending the contracts protects everyone.
Council votes end contracts. More than 150 communities have canceled, rejected, or switched off plate readers since 2021, more than 100 of them this year, according to DeFlock. If you want to do more than route around the cameras:
Take it to your city council.
DeFlock’s guides cover what to say, organizing, and public records requests.
Send this page to a neighbor.