August 17 2026
(from Gemini)
Garrett Langley – Founder and CEO of Flock Safety
- Scale, Community Footprint & Public Safety Impact: Founded nine years ago, Flock Safety has expanded into roughly 6,000 cities across the United States. Over the past year, the technology helped law enforcement solve over one million crimes and recover more than 10,000 missing persons (including Amber Alerts, abducted children, and elderly individuals with dementia). In a single representative month, the platform assisted in finding 1,125 missing people and recovering over 20,000 stolen vehicles.
- ALPR Technology Boundaries vs. Competitor Overreach: Flock’s automated license plate reading (ALPR) cameras take still images of vehicles and capture identifying external characteristics—such as license plates, makes, models, colors, roof racks, bumper stickers, dents, and missing hubcaps. Langley emphasizes clear product boundaries that differentiate Flock from competitors: the system does not perform facial recognition, does not record continuous video, does not peer through windshields into vehicle cabins, and does not allow searches for individuals.
- Data Retention Defaults & Local Governance: Treating stored data as a liability rather than an asset, Flock reduced its default data retention window from 30 days down to 7 days, estimating that ~90% of solvable crimes are resolved within a one-week period. The remaining 10% typically involve delayed discoveries (such as homicides discovered days later via welfare checks or sexual assaults reported after trauma delays). Flock leaves the final retention policy up to democratically elected city councils and state statutes (which range from New Hampshire’s 3-minute limit to New Jersey’s 5-year retention).
- Curbing Police Misuse with Automated "Audit Assistance": To prevent internal law enforcement abuses—such as rogue officers running unauthorized searches or stalking individuals—Flock transitioned away from passive manual log reviews (where supervisors only spot-checked 10 to 20 searches a month). Four months ago, Flock deployed an automated "Audit Assistance" tool that flags anomalous behavior (e.g., repeatedly querying a specific license plate without placing it on the department-wide broadcast "hot list"). The system has already led to the identification and termination of bad actors (such as nine fired officers in Georgia), and Flock has made this audit feature mandatory for all agency clients.
- Human-in-the-Loop AI vs. Predictive Policing: Langley rejects predictive policing models that attempt to algorithmically "define suspicion" or forecast crimes before they occur. Flock keeps a strict "human-in-the-loop" standard, deploying AI only as an investigative tool to assist human detectives in narrowing down objective vehicle evidence after a crime has occurred. He also cautions against deploying unvetted generative AI in high-stakes public safety environments, such as replacing human 911 dispatchers with hallucination-prone voice agents.
- Drone as First Responder (DFR) Technology: Drones represent Flock’s fastest-growing business unit as ALPR drops to under 50% of forward-looking revenue. Autonomous drones live in rooftop weatherproof docking stations at fire stations and police precincts, launching immediately upon a 911 call to reach scenes in under a minute at 60 mph and 400 feet altitude. Equipped with 40x optical zoom, these drones provide real-time situational awareness that can de-escalate volatile calls before armed officers arrive (e.g., identifying a reported firearm as a toy lighter at a gas station). Drone flight logs and camera data are published with delays to municipal transparency portals for public oversight.
- Misinformation, Municipal Churn & Re-Adoptions: While approximately 1% (~60–70) of municipal clients cancelled contracts over privacy protests and PR controversies, roughly 20 cities have already reversed course and reinstated the cameras. Langley notes that contract cancellations often stemmed from misinformation confusing Flock with facial-recognition competitors. He argues that automated safety tools are especially critical for less affluent communities that lack the private security guards, gated infrastructure, and residential cameras accessible to wealthy neighborhoods.
Comments