An automated license plate reader managed by Flock Safety has operated in front of UC Santa Barbara’s Santa Catalina Residence Hall for over a year. According to the Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Office, the data from these cameras is used for criminal investigations.
The Nexus was unable to confirm whether UCSB has access to the information gathered by the camera near Santa Catalina. Jaesa Verdaguer / Daily Nexus
Flock Safety is a private company that manufactures security software and hardware, including license plate readers. Automated License Plate Recognition (ALPR) Systems take photos of passing cars and record license plates and identifiable features such as car type and accessories. As suggested by their name, these cameras automatically capture and store the license plates of all passing cars, regardless of whether the driver is actively being investigated.
The Nexus was unable to confirm whether UCSB has access to the information gathered by the camera near Santa Catalina. The University did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
According to the SBC Sheriff’s Office Public Information Officer Raquel Zick, UC Santa Barbara did not “[play] a role” in installing the camera near Santa Catalina. The second-closest Flock cameras to campus are three located in the Camino Real Marketplace.
Recently, motion-censor cameras were installed near the lagoon. According to second-year political science major Evan Sussman, those cameras are operated by Live View Technologies through a partnership with the UC Police Department.
There are a total of 12 operational Flock cameras in Santa Barbara, and the data is stored for 30 days.
Escalations in immigration enforcement have brought the use of Flock cameras into the limelight. Per reporting by the Santa Barbara Independent, local immigration advocates have questioned the locations of these cameras, with five cameras being located in the Westside of Santa Barbara. The Westside has a larger percentage of undocumented people, roughly 28%, compared to the broader Santa Barbara County (SBC), which sits at about 15%.
According to the Santa Barbara Police Department’s contract with Flock, the data collected by these cameras is not given to federal enforcement agencies. Per Senate Bill 34, state law enforcement agencies cannot share data from license plate readers with federal agencies.
In January, Flock released a statement stating that it does not directly share information with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (I.C.E.). In the last several years, civil liberties groups found that local law enforcement agencies in California have informally conducted license plate searches for I.C.E. and Border Patrol as recently as 2023. Santa Barbara law enforcement entities were not named in the 2024 lawsuit. Other lawsuits have followed in recent years.
According to search audit results from the SBPD, before mid-December 2025, most searches in Santa Barbara disclosed specific reasons such as “Rape Investigation,” “possible suspect vehicle” and “hit and run.” After that point, all search reasons were labeled as “criminal investigation” and “investigative intel” until early February. Since Feb. 2, search reasons have been labeled as “Withheld By Officer.”
The SBPD did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the changes.
A version of this article appeared on p. 1 of the Feb. 26, 2026 edition of the Daily Nexus
