Flock Safety’s founder and chief executive used a Disrupt stage appearance on Wednesday to decline the premise of his critics. Garrett Langley argued that a society that wants people who commit crimes to face a higher probability of accountability should not pause progress, and that the privacy cost of camera networks is the price of that outcome. He compared the technology to driverless cars, saying the answer to an accident is to improve, not to shut down.
The context is a business under pressure. Flock, which sells license plate cameras and other recording devices to police and cities, has faced cancelled contracts and layoffs as opposition to always on surveillance has organised locally. Langley attributed some cancellations to misinformation, noting that customers have ended contracts believing the cameras perform facial recognition; Flock says its cameras do not, though reporting has documented an ability to detect and track people.
On safeguards, his position was delegation. Flock will provide recommendations and defaults but aims to minimise mandated features, functions and policies, leaving use decisions to city leaders and police departments. Pressed on abuse and invasiveness, he offered no specific mechanism, while conceding the company is far from perfect and has made mistakes.
That stance is now the contested centre of the municipal surveillance market. Buyers who want a vendor imposed floor on retention, sharing and audit will not find one in Flock’s stated model, and the renewal fights in US cities this year will test whether chief executives’ candour about the trade off helps or hurts the installed base.