Garrett Langley, Flock Safety's CEO, on how the company's principled framework protects privacy and promotes objectivity

Flock Safety is committed to eliminating crime while protecting privacy and ensuring transparency. See how our technology supports safer communities.

By , May 22, 2026

15 minutes to read

About Flock

Published: April 5, 2022

Our mission is to eliminate crime. Full stop. We do so within a principled framework that protects privacy and promotes objectivity. At Flock Safety, we believe it is imperative that we work together with our communities, openly and transparently, with the best people, technological products, and thoughtful policies. We also believe that ethical public safety should be an apolitical position and we genuinely strive to bring communities together to pursue exactly this. And at the end of the day, if people do not understand how we’re designing our systems to eliminate crime within a principled framework, that is on me to better explain it.

I’ll break this down into three parts: privacy, impact on historically disadvantaged communities, and giving a voice to the residents of the community.

Privacy

Regarding privacy, we believe it’s incredibly important to start with the right questions. What type of data is collected? Who has access to that data? What can they do with the data? How long is the data retained? Since our founding in 2017, Flock has consistently answered these questions:

  1. Type of data - we collect the objective, indiscriminate evidence needed to solve crime. We started by focusing on vehicles and license plates since according to the International Association of Chiefs of Police, 70% of crime involves a vehicle. And recently we launched a new, separate product, to capture more types of evidence, like the audio signature of a gunshot. But just as important as what we do collect, is what we do not collect. We do not focus on personally identifiable information, including facial recognition, biometric data, or even the registration of the vehicle owners. While you can filter on vehicle details like the presence of a roof rack or a bumper sticker, you cannot filter on the type of bumper sticker, like a political party or a house of worship.

  2. Access to data - our customers 100% own their data. Flock does not sell customer data or monetize it. Data access and sharing remain controlled by the customer, except as required by law. Unlike location services on your phone or financial services with your credit card, where you may not know what data is being sold and to whom, with Flock you know exactly who has access to the license plate data. Every search for evidence is logged, requires a search reason, and is auditable. You know the data is never being sold to anyone. And you know it will only be used as evidence in the event of a crime, otherwise it is permanently deleted.

  3. What is the data used for - Solving and preventing crime. 80%+ of all property crime goes unsolved. 50% of violent crime goes unsolved. These facts are reported by the FBI. In line with these statistics, this means that if you are the victim of one of the 7,000,000 property crimes that occur every year, the crime probably will go unsolved and you’ll lose your property.

  4. Data retention - All data is stored in the cloud and by default, deleted automatically every 30 days, on a rolling basis. We were the first provider of ALPR technology to institute a 30-day data retention period by default, as a short retention period limits the exposure of sensitive data.

Beyond the ways we have approached these questions, we have also reviewed federal case law and observed time and again that capturing license plate data for a limited time is clearly not a violation of privacy.
Commonwealth vs. McCarthy established that while people have a constitutionally protected expectation of privacy in the whole of their public movements, that interest was not invaded by the limited extent and use of ALPR data.
United States vs. Yang held that people did not have a reasonable expectation of privacy in the historical location data of a vehicle.

We understand the disparate impacts of the criminal justice system on historically marginalized communities. There has also been much scholarship that shows that crime disproportionately impacts historically marginalized communities, particularly communities of color, and when we use objective evidence to solve crime and quickly clear cases, we actually benefit those same communities at a greater rate.

This body of research clearly shows that when you appropriately invest in law enforcement 1) you can actually solve and prevent crime and 2) the communities that see the greatest benefit are historically marginalized communities, particularly communities of color.

When I hear about the reported 22% reduction in crime in the Las Vegas Trail community in Fort Worth, TX (a primarily Black community) or the “year of peace” in the Haynes Park community in Nashville, TN (a primarily Black community), I remember that it is not my job to speak for communities of color. It’s my job to listen to those communities and help provide the technology they are asking for.

We value transparency at Flock, and to that point, our team has spoken in public at hundreds of city council meetings, advocating for transparent policies regarding public safety technology. In fact, I would go as far as to say that our team has spoken in public, in front of elected officials, about ALPR technology, more than any other person or group in history.

At Flock, we genuinely believe that it’s possible to support proven law enforcement efforts at crime reduction (it’s our mission) and do so within a principled framework. Since 2017, Flock cameras have played a critical role in reducing crime and solving cases across the country.

At Flock, we recognize that nothing is perfect. While our technology is working as designed, there is always room improvement. We continue to invite full transparency into our technology, and we would love to work with more organizations to deliver on our mission to eliminate crime.

Garrett Langley
Founder and CEO of Flock Safety