A San Diego activist, Anthony Ralphs, has gone viral after appearing at a city council meeting dressed as Darth Vader to satirically endorse Flock Safety's automated licence-plate-reading cameras, with the clip drawing millions of views on TikTok and Instagram. Ralphs, a DJ, event producer and agriculture consultant, has spent roughly the past year campaigning against San Diego Police Department's use of the surveillance technology, and decided to reveal himself as the man behind the mask once the video's popularity grew, using the stunt to draw wider attention to the issue.

His opposition intensified after a December council vote to continue using Flock despite roughly 300 attendees, some 95% of them opposed, turning out to object; subsequent meetings drew far fewer people, prompting Ralphs to take a break from his studies to advocate consistently. He points to San Diego's $120 million budget deficit, arts programme cuts, and the city's $2.2 million Flock contract as evidence of misplaced priorities, alongside the case of Hugo Parra, a San Diego man wrongly imprisoned for 30 days after an erroneous Flock camera match, who is now suing the city for $1.5 million alongside a co-defendant.