Missouri Republican Sen. Josh Hawley, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Counterterrorism, sent a formal letter to Flock Safety CEO Garrett Langley on Aug. 26, demanding a full accounting of the company’s nationwide surveillance network. The Senate panel set a Sept. 8 deadline for the firm to turn over documents on data retention, sales practices, and software safeguards.
Scope of the investigation
Flock Safety, based in Atlanta, operates more than 120,000 cameras in 49 states and processes over 20 billion vehicle scans each month. Law‑enforcement agencies have praised the technology for helping solve crimes, recover stolen vehicles, and locate kidnapping suspects. Hawley, however, warned that the system creates an unauthorized dragnet of innocent citizens, noting that the Supreme Court has recognized a comprehensive, retrospective record of a person’s movements as distinct from ordinary public observation.
Examples of alleged misuse
The letter cites several incidents that illustrate potential abuse. In St. Charles County, Missouri, an audit revealed a civilian employee used the system for personal searches unrelated to law‑enforcement duties, prompting the police department to cancel its contract. In Milwaukee, Wisconsin, prosecutors charged an officer who entered a girlfriend’s license plate 124 times and her former boyfriend’s plate 55 times, using “investigation” as the justification each time.
High‑profile errors have also emerged. In Florida, a woman spent 13 days in jail on felony vehicular homicide charges after investigators relied on a vehicle description generated by Flock’s network. Prosecutors dropped the charges seven months later when the true suspect was identified. A California department reported a 71 percent error rate in automated alerts, and the Los Angeles Police Department terminated its contract after an audit found 161 vehicles were mistakenly flagged as stolen within two months.
Company response and existing safeguards
Flock Safety’s CEO Garrett Langley told CBS News that the firm has learned from early missteps and introduced tighter software rules, such as requiring official case numbers for searches and limiting default data storage periods. Nonetheless, Hawley argued that internal policies alone cannot replace robust federal oversight, writing that “your company’s internal policies are, in practice, the only safeguards for hundreds of millions of Americans.”
Broader context
The Senate inquiry arrives amid growing scrutiny of the company’s practices. Prior reporting by The Washington Post documented dozens of officer misconduct cases linked to the camera network, while Forbes revealed installations on public roads without required permits. Civil‑liberties groups have warned that the pooled database tracks everyday movements without judicial warrants, and Fortune highlighted questions about commercial uses tied to Flock’s $8.3 billion valuation.
As the Trump administration continues to champion law‑enforcement tools that protect communities while safeguarding constitutional rights, the probe underscores the need for clear, federal standards that respect privacy and parental‑rights concerns. Hawley’s request for transparency aims to ensure that technology meant to keep neighborhoods safe does not erode the freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution.
Original reporting: Tampa Free Press — read the source article.
