California
Stanislaus County
On record
Checked 21 Aug 2026- Technologies
- 2
- Systems
- 3
- Devices mapped
- 270
Stanislaus County, California. Device data © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL), with community reporting via DeFlock. Open the full map →
Most counties on this site show cities each deciding separately what to buy. Stanislaus shows something else: a countywide plate reader network that cities join rather than build. Turlock’s own staff report says the city joined it in 2023, and that membership means access to other members’ cameras across the county, with any member able to flag a vehicle that alerts all of them.
Turlock is also the county’s most transparent department, and the two facts are connected. It publishes its policy manual, its plate reader procedure and its military equipment inventories under state law, which is how anyone can read that its plate reader policy sets no retention period at all and defers the question, for data that arrives from a vendor, to the vendor.
In 2025 the city council considered two further items. One added Flock cameras at thirteen more intersections for $1.13 million over five years, funded half from a cannabis tax reserve and half from a sales tax measure reserve, giving the department access to three separate plate databases. The other bought software that pulls dispatch, records, body-worn camera footage and two plate reader systems into one searchable place, which the report says the county’s largest police department and the Sheriff’s Office already use.
Two pages cover Turlock. Modesto, the county’s largest city, has not been researched at all, and neither has the Sheriff’s Office whose network this is.
What's in use here
Sixteen sites, thirty-six cameras, at the entrances and exits of a city of 25,000, leased since 2019 and paid for out of cannabis revenue. The staff report says the data is not shared with other agencies.
A city of 73,000 with access to three separate plate reader databases, joined to a countywide network it did not build. Its published policy sets no retention period, and says so in a section short enough to read in full.
other
Software that pulls dispatch, records, a legacy mainframe, body-worn camera footage and two plate reader systems into one searchable place. The staff report says the county's largest police department and the Sheriff's Office already run it.
Who runs it
The agency is the accountability unit: who voted, whose policy applies, and who answers a records request.
| Agency | Jurisdiction | Systems |
|---|---|---|
| Turlock Police Department | City of Turlock | 2 |
| Riverbank Police Services | City of Riverbank | 1 |
| 2 agencies on record. A jointly run system counts against each of its operators, so this column is not a county total. | ||
Trackers
Meetings, contracts, records
Nothing listed yet. The trackers launch here, and facts appear only with their sources.
How the inventory works →What you can do
Civic action
Show up
Public comment is open to any resident, and you do not have to be an expert to use it. We have not yet confirmed where the bodies that decide for Stanislaus County meet. How the inventory works explains what we check and how to check it yourself.
How the inventory works →Personal protection
Protect yourself
Practical steps to shrink your personal data trail. Our guides publish at launch; until then, EFF's Surveillance Self-Defense is the best starting point.
Surveillance Self-Defense ↗Get the digest
A regular digest of what changed in the world of surveillance: the counties we published, the devices that appeared on the map, and the public meetings where these decisions get made. We send it when there is enough to report.
One click to unsubscribe. What we do with your address is on the newsletter page.