Senator Josh Hawley of Missouri is investigating Flock Safety, the maker of the now-ubiquitous AI-powered Flock cameras, demanding answers from the company about how it captures and retains data on millions of Americans.
With over 120,000 cameras in 49 states, Flock has been under scrutiny from the American public for weeks, with some vigilantes destroying the automated license plate readers (ALPR). Now, the Atlanta-based company has to contend with a Senate investigation demanding troves of documentation on its policies, as well as details on how some of the data it captured has been misused.
In his letter to Flock, Hawley pointed out that its cameras conduct more than 20 billion vehicle scans monthly, while "the overwhelming majority of the Americans captured in those records did nothing wrong" and all that information is searchable in a national database for Flock’s customers.
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Hawley also laid out numerous cases of misuse of Flock’s data, including police officers using the database for stalking rather than crime investigation.
The letter also highlighted cases of Flock cameras providing incorrect information on cars its surveilled; mistakes that have led to people being wrongfully imprisoned.
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"A Florida woman spent 13 days in jail and faced eight felony counts, including three counts of vehicular homicide, after investigators arrested an owner based on their search of Flock’s network for a vehicle description,” Hawley wrote. "Prosecutors dismissed the charges seven months later when law enforcement discovered the error and arrested a different person. One California police department found that a staggering 71% of its alerts were wrong, and the Los Angeles Police Department dropped its Flock contract after an audit showed officers had stopped 161 vehicles incorrectly flagged as stolen in the space of two months."
Hawley also wants clarity on how Flock handles the data it captures.
"Flock’s $8.3 billion valuation comes with enormous pressure to find new commercial applications," Hawley wrote. "Americans demand a full accounting for how their driver data is stored or sold."
Hawley wants Flock to provide answers on:
Which customers are allowed to conduct statewide or nationwide searches of vehicle or driver data
The retention period of its data
All the times Flock cameras have been misused, and whether Flock caught the misuse itself
What a Flock user has to do to justify a search on another person’s vehicle
What restrictions exist on vehicle searches, and whether those restrictions can be circumvented
What are Flock’s own measures of accuracy when it comes to capturing vehicle information
Specifics on how Flock captures data, e.g., photos, videos, audio, wireless signals
Details on whether Flock ever linked captured data to an external source, like a data broker
Whether vehicle searches require multi-factor authentication and, if Flock is not currently requiring it, when it will
"Describe in detail whether Flock has the capability to biometrically track individuals"
Hawley wants Flock to answer all its questions by Sept. 8.
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Neal joined Mashable’s Social Good team in 2024, editing and writing stories about digital culture and its effects on the environment and marginalized communities. He is the former editorial director of The Advocate and Out magazines, has contributed to the Los Angeles Times, Curbed, and Los Angeles magazine, and is a recipient of the Sarah Pettit Memorial Award for LGBTQ Journalist of the Year Award from the National Gay and Lesbian Journalists Association (NLGJA). He lives in Los Angeles with his family.