When securing your home or business, the goal is simple: protect your property and the people you care about. For decades, local security systems have done exactly that. But in recent years, a new model has emerged—one that shifts the focus from protecting individual properties to tracking entire communities.

Companies like Flock Safety are building nationwide, automated mass surveillance networks. While marketed as a tool for public safety, these systems have sparked massive controversy, lawsuits, and civil rights concerns.

If you are evaluating security options for your property or neighborhood, it is critical to understand the difference between local surveillance (like Montavue) and mass surveillance (like Flock Safety).

At their core, Montavue and Flock Safety represent two entirely different philosophies regarding security, data ownership, and privacy.

How Local Surveillance Works (Montavue)

Local surveillance is designed to protect a specific area—your home, your business, or your neighborhood entrance.

• You Own the Data: Your cameras record directly to a localized Network Video Recorder (NVR) or Digital Video Recorder (DVR). Even if there's an option for cloud storage, its still only accessable to you.

• Total Control: The footage belongs to you. No one—not the camera manufacturer, not the police, and not the federal government—can access your video unless you explicitly choose to share it.

• Focused Security: The system is completely self-contained. It monitors your property without tracking the daily movements of innocent people driving across town.

How Flock Safety Works (The Mass Surveillance Model)

Flock Safety operates Automated License Plate Reader (ALPR) cameras. These solar-powered cameras are placed on streets and intersections to capture every single vehicle that passes by.

• Centralized Tracking: Flock’s cameras don’t just record video; their AI logs the license plate, make, model, color, roof racks, and even bumper stickers of every car.

• Shared Databases: This data is uploaded to a centralized cloud database where it is stored for 30 days and made fully searchable.

• Mass Access: Your vehicle's movements are often automatically shared with hundreds of police departments, out-of-state agencies, and federal entities within seconds.
  
  

While Flock Safety claims its technology is designed to solve crimes, its mass surveillance model has led to severe consequences for innocent citizens and cities alike. Here is why communities across the country—and major police departments like the LAPD—are terminating their contracts with Flock.

1. False Identifications and Wrongful Arrests

AI is not perfect, and when an ALPR camera misreads a license plate, innocent people pay the price. Flock’s cameras take billions of photos a month, and a minor machine error can quickly escalate into a life-threatening situation.

• Arkansas: A Flock camera misread the license plate of an SUV, leading police to pull over an innocent couple and detain them at gunpoint while their six-week-old baby sat in the back seat.

• San Diego: Officers searching for a red Alfa Romeo relied on Flock’s "vehicle signature" technology instead of a license plate. The system flagged a superficially matching car five miles away, leading police to arrest three completely innocent occupants.

2. Violating Laws and Illegal Data Sharing

Flock’s aggressive data-sharing practices have landed the company and its government partners in legal hot water.

• California Lawsuits: The state of California actually passed strict laws to limit how license plate data is shared to protect immigrant communities. However, a recent class-action lawsuit and action by the California Attorney General alleges that Flock’s system illegally shared local data with out-of-state and federal agencies millions of times.

• Operating Without a License: In Texas, the Department of Public Safety fined Flock Safety after discovering the company had been installing its surveillance infrastructure and operating without the required state license.

3. Police Abuse for Personal Use

Any time you create a massive, searchable database of where people go every day, bad actors will abuse it. There have been at least 14 documented cases where police officers misused Flock cameras to illegally stalk romantic interests, leading to job terminations and criminal charges.

4. Misleading the Public and Openly Lying to City Councils

One of the most concerning aspects of Flock Safety is the documented pattern of its CEO, Garrett Langley, and other executives openly lying to city officials to secure contracts. When confronted with these falsehoods, the company has repeatedly tried to downplay them.

• Lying About Tracking Capabilities: In Oshkosh, Wisconsin, a Flock representative explicitly told the city council that their cameras did not create a "pattern of life" or "heat map" of a person's daily movements. Based on this assurance, the city approved the contract. The very next day, an ACLU report exposed that Flock’s system does include a heat map feature capable of tracking a vehicle's specific locations for an entire month. When the city immediately revoked the contract, Flock dismissed their lie as just a "minor nuance".

• Lying About Federal Data Sharing: Denver City Council President Amanda Sandoval publicly stated that Flock CEO Garrett Langley "lied to [her] face" regarding who had access to their surveillance data. Flock initially concealed that local data would be commingled in the cloud and shared with federal agencies like Homeland Security and ICE. When the truth came out, Langley was forced to send Sandoval a formal apology. Flock has repeatedly published misleading statements to create a false sense of security regarding their data-sharing practices.

• Attacking Privacy Advocates: Instead of taking accountability for these transparency failures, CEO Garrett Langley has gone on the offensive. In communications to law enforcement, Langley has aggressively attacked citizens and community groups raising valid privacy concerns, accusing them of trying to "normalize lawlessness," wanting to let "murderers go free," and even labeling local opposition groups as "terroristic organizations".

At Montavue, we believe that you shouldn't have to sacrifice your community's civil liberties to feel safe. We fundamentally disagree with the mass surveillance model, the unchecked data sharing, and the centralized tracking of innocent citizens.

Because of the severe privacy violations, lack of transparency, and ethical concerns associated with their network, Montavue does not support Flock Safety in what they do, and we will absolutely never partner with them.

We are committed to a different standard. When you install a Montavue system, you are taking proactive, responsible steps to secure your property without compromising the rights of your neighbors. With Montavue:

• You own the equipment.

• You own the network.

• Most importantly, you own the data.

Before giving up your privacy to an unproven, controversy-ridden mass surveillance network, choose a local, private solution that puts the power back in your hands. True security starts with protecting your data.

True security shouldn't require sacrificing your community's privacy. When you install a Montavue system, you are taking proactive, responsible steps to secure your property. You own the equipment, you own the network, and most importantly, you own the data.

Before giving up your privacy to an unproven, controversy-ridden mass surveillance network, consider a local, private solution that puts the power back in your hands.

For more information on the controversies and legal issues surrounding mass surveillance and automated license plate readers (ALPRs), you can review the following reports and investigations:

• Arkansas Wrongful Arrest: Forbes / Institute for Justice — Police Detained An Innocent Family At Gunpoint Because Of An AI License Plate Reader (Details the incident where a Flock camera misread a license plate, leading to a family being held at gunpoint).

• San Diego "Vehicle Signature" Arrest: Voice of San Diego / Times of San Diego — Flock license plate reader falsely links San Diego man to crime (Reports on the San Diego Police Department's false arrest of three innocent people based on Flock's AI vehicle search features matching the wrong car).

• Texas Licensing Fines: VICE / Motherboard / Galveston Justice — Flock Safety License Plate Reader Controversy in Texas (Investigations revealing that the Texas Department of Public Safety fined Flock Safety for operating and installing surveillance infrastructure without the required state private security licenses).

• Illegal Data Sharing Lawsuits: Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) — EFF, ACLU to SFPD: Stop Illegally Sharing Data and Class Action Lawsuits (Class-action lawsuits detailing how local ALPR data was shared with out-of-state and federal agencies in violation of California privacy laws).

• Police Misuse and Stalking: VICE / Motherboard / PCMag — More Like Stalking Than Security: The Quiet Threat of License Plate Cameras (Documented investigations highlighting at least a dozen cases where law enforcement officers abused the Flock network to stalk romantic interests and ex-partners).

• Oshkosh Contract Revocation & Heat Maps: American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) — "Fast-Growing Company Flock is Building a New AI-Driven Mass-Surveillance System" (This report exposed Flock's "heat map" tracking features, leading cities like Oshkosh, Wisconsin to revoke their contracts after feeling misled about the technology's tracking capabilities).

• Flock's Lies and Heat Map Expose: American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) — Flock Safety Credibility Lost as it Repeatedly Lies to City Councils (Details how Flock dismissed lying to the Oshkosh city council as a "minor nuance")

• Denver CEO Apology: 9News Denver / Reddit User Documentation — Denver Signals Plan to Replace Flock (Documents Denver City Council President Amanda Sandoval stating the Flock CEO "lied to my face" regarding Homeland Security contracts and cloud data commingling).

• CEO Attacks on Critics: American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) — Flock CEO Goes Ballistic on Critics as More Americans Question Mass Driver Surveillance (Highlights Garrett Langley's aggressive communications calling critics "activists trying to let murderers go free").

• https://deflock.org/