Hawley opens investigation into Flock Safety’s national camera network
Sen. Josh Hawley is demanding answers from Flock Safety about its network of more than 120,000 AI-powered cameras, as Texas cities cut ties with the company over privacy and data-sharing concerns.
Sen. Josh Hawley has launched an investigation into Flock Safety, demanding answers about whether the company’s rapidly expanding network of AI-powered cameras has created a searchable national database of Americans’ movements. The Missouri Republican, who chairs the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Counterterrorism, sent a letter Wednesday to Flock CEO Garrett Langley questioning who has access to the data collected by the company’s more than 120,000 cameras across 49 states.
«Flock has assembled an unprecedented national surveillance network,» Hawley said. «They boast more than 120,000 cameras across 49 states and more than 20 billion vehicle scans every month. I’m investigating Flock cameras to determine who has access to hundreds of millions of Americans’ data and what they’re doing with it. Americans deserve answers.»
Flock’s automated license plate reader cameras capture passing vehicles and log details including license plate, vehicle description, location and time. The Atlanta-based company markets the technology to law enforcement agencies, businesses and homeowners associations. Hawley argued the network goes far beyond the discrete, local investigations for which law enforcement surveillance tools are traditionally used.
«Instead of serving discrete local investigations, as contemplated by our constitutional processes and safeguards, these camera networks harness artificial intelligence to pool what they capture into a national database that customers can search,» Hawley wrote in the letter.
Robert Frommer, director of the Institute for Justice’s Project on the Fourth Amendment, said the core concern is not simply the use of cameras but police being able to search a person’s past movements without first getting approval from a judge. «The No. 1 reform that I think is needed here is a warrant,» Frommer said. «Go to a judge, explain to the judge why you should be able to use this tool.»
Frommer said police should still be able to act immediately in genuine emergencies, including cases involving imminent danger or missing people, but should be required to justify the search afterward if there was no time to obtain a warrant. «Most law enforcement searches are things that happen within a few days of the crime,» he said. «You don’t need to be keeping this gigantic database on everybody’s movements.»
Flock spokesperson Paris Lewbel said the company had received Hawley’s letter and would respond directly to the subcommittee’s questions. «We look forward to working with Senator Hawley and the Subcommittee to provide additional context about how our technology works, the safeguards built into our platform and how law enforcement agencies use Flock to solve crime and find missing people,» Lewbel said.
The investigation comes as a growing number of cities and counties reconsider their relationships with Flock, citing concerns over data sharing, privacy and the potential for misuse. On Tuesday, the Pflugerville City Council voted unanimously to end the Texas city’s agreement with Flock. City staff will turn off all 28 automated license plate reader cameras covered by the contract and disable access to the system, according to the city.
«Public safety and public trust have to go hand in hand, and recent revelations about the Flock system have fueled concerns throughout the community; we can’t engage with organizations we can’t trust,» Pflugerville Mayor Doug Weiss said in a statement. Pflugerville police had used Flock cameras since 2020. The city had considered a new two-year agreement that included updated privacy, security and data policies, but officials said they lost confidence in the company’s ability to meet the city’s standards.
Rep. Keith Self, R-Texas, echoed Hawley’s concerns in a post Wednesday on X, arguing the Fourth Amendment «is not up for ‘compromise.’» «Our Founders did not risk their lives so a CEO could trade our rights for profit and perceived ‘safety,’» Self wrote, invoking Benjamin Franklin’s warning against giving up essential liberty for temporary safety.
Hawley said law enforcement needs tools to catch offenders and keep communities safe but argued Americans should not have to surrender their privacy while carrying out everyday routines. «Americans do not surrender their privacy rights when they drive to work, drop their kids off at school, or go to church,» Hawley wrote. «The Supreme Court has recognized that a comprehensive, retrospective record of a person’s movements is different in kind from ordinary observation in public.»
Frommer said Flock’s position that agencies control their own data-sharing settings does not resolve the privacy issue when those agencies can be connected to far broader networks than they realize. «The fact that they technically control the data is a false promise when reality has shown that these things are often spread much further than agencies expected,» he said.
