Surveillance technology company Flock is rolling out a series of policy updates after investigative reports showed police officers across the United States misusing its license plate tracking data to stalk romantic partners and target individuals for harassment. Chief Executive Garrett Langley delivered what amounted to a public apology, saying the company should have acted sooner to prevent the abuse. In an interview, he said he had changed his mind about where the responsibility lies: Flock, he now says, has an obligation to make sure its tools do not create harms that can be avoided.

The changes, which will be implemented over the coming weeks, mark a significant shift for a company that previously argued it was up to local policymakers to set guardrails around its technology. Now, Flock is requiring features that were once optional, tightening default data retention, and giving police departments finer control over how information is shared with other agencies.

What Flock is changing

The centerpiece of the update is Audit Assistance, a feature that flags abnormal search behavior and immediately locks out suspicious users until an administrator reviews their activity. Until now, the tool was optional, and Flock says only about a third of the law enforcement agencies it works with had turned it on. The company says that among agencies that did use it, identification of potential abuse rose significantly. Now the company is making Audit Assistance a requirement for all customers.

In addition, all users will be required to enter a case code when running a search. The goal is to make it harder for officers to query the system for personal reasons or other nefarious purposes. An administrator can override the requirement for emergencies, such as tracking a missing child, but those overrides will be automatically flagged for later review.

Flock is also shortening the default period it retains data collected by its automatic license plate readers, or ALPRs, from 30 days to seven days. The change moves closer to limits long recommended by civil liberties groups such as the American Civil Liberties Union. Police departments will still be able to choose a longer retention period, and Flock is introducing a new “Evidence Mode” that preserves searches tied to a specific case number, so useful evidence is not lost while limiting the urge to collect data without a clear purpose.

Individual police departments previously had to share data with other agencies on an all-or-nothing basis. Under the new system, they will be able to set granular limits. For example, a city police department might allow a neighboring county sheriff’s office to search its Flock data while investigating a homicide suspect but prohibit access for immigration enforcement or other unrelated purposes.

ACLU expresses cautious skepticism

Civil liberties groups have greeted the announcements with caution. The ACLU released an analysis of Flock’s changes, saying the updates appear “more focused on addressing a perceived PR problem than the significant harms its products create.” The organization did call the shorter default data retention period a potential “step in the right direction,” but warned that the real-world impact will depend on how Evidence Mode and the audit tools are implemented.

“We need independent testing and review of these systems to know whether they actually prevent abuse or simply document it after the fact,” the analysis said. The ACLU has also called for stronger legal limits on the collection and sharing of ALPR data, arguing that voluntary corporate policy changes are not a substitute for legislation.

Abuse reports and precedents

The policy changes follow several high-profile cases of alleged ALPR misuse. A police chief in Braselton, Georgia, was reported to have searched his ex-girlfriend’s license plate more than 500 times over a seven-month period. In California, prosecutors alleged that a former Riverside County Sheriff’s Office deputy used Flock data to stalk and harass his ex-girlfriend, including looking up the license plates of men she was dating. Those cases are among the most recent in a pattern that goes back years.

The nonprofit Institute for Justice says reports of Flock and other ALPR abuse date back to at least 2021. Over time, the incidents have drawn increasing public attention and have become a talking point for privacy advocates who argue that mass surveillance tools are ripe for misuse. While the technology can help solve crimes, critics say the same data can be weaponized by bad actors inside law enforcement.

Flock’s CEO acknowledged during the interview that the company now expects more cases to surface. “You are going to see more officers fired and more officers arrested for abusing police power,” he said, predicting that mandatory audit tools will make it easier to detect misconduct. Previously, departments often had to manually comb through thousands of lines of logs, making it easy for abuse to go unnoticed.

From combative to contrite

Langley’s public tone has shifted noticeably. In the past, he had been combative with critics. In a Forbes interview last year, he called DeFlock, a website that tracks the installation of Flock technologies across the country, a “terroristic” group. He later apologized and said in July that the characterization was a “mistake.” The new mea culpa goes further, acknowledging that the company itself, not just lawmakers, bears some responsibility for how its products are used.

Advocacy groups including the Electronic Frontier Foundation have also accused Flock of misleading public officials about the risks of its tools. They have warned that data collected by ALPRs could be used to track people seeking abortion care in states where abortion is restricted. Flock has said its policies prohibit searches related to reproductive care in states where such searches are restricted, but skeptics argue that the company has not done enough to ensure those rules are followed.

In a previous instance, Flock reportedly dismissed criticism by blaming confusion over a nuanced issue. The latest changes suggest a more serious attempt to address the concerns, but civil liberties groups remain wary of the company’s motives.

CEO cites community conversations and public safety

Langley says his changing views came from frequent conversations with communities across the country, including at city council meetings and other public events. He acknowledged that many critics will not immediately trust his intentions, saying, “All I guess I’m asking for is for a fair shot.” He still believes that state legislators and Congress should make the key decisions about how police use surveillance tools, and he hopes that if such rules are adopted, competing ALPR companies will be forced to follow the same standards.

But he now concedes that the regulatory process moves slowly, and that companies cannot simply wait for laws to catch up. “This is such an obvious way to curb abuse,” he said of the case-code requirement. “And I said, ‘Fine. You know what? I think that’s right, and we got this one wrong. We should make it a requirement.’”

Langley also defended the public safety benefits of the technology. According to the company, in July alone Flock helped locate nearly a thousand missing people and more than 22,000 stolen cars. “I’m still surprised. I got our July update a week ago, and we helped find almost a thousand missing people, over 22,000 stolen cars — in July. That’s crazy. That’s such a big impact on the world. And what I came to realize over time was that the responsibility that bears with it is an obligation to make sure that it’s creating a society that we both, you and I, and everyone around us, want to raise their kids in.”

The company’s changes are likely to please neither unqualified supporters nor staunch privacy advocates. The mandatory Audit Assistance and shorter data retention are concrete steps, but the ACLU’s demand for independent review shows that trust will not come quickly. Flock’s challenge now is to prove that the new policies are not merely cosmetic, and that the CEO’s apology translates into meaningful, lasting reform.

Source:The Verge News