Flock closed its conference to press, then canceled a critic's hotel

Our Take

The irony practically writes itself. Flock Safety's entire pitch to city councils is that there's no expectation of privacy in public — that's the legal foundation for blanketing streets with license plate readers. So it's worth sitting with the fact that when Benn Jordan, a longtime critic who's spent years documenting how the company's cameras actually work, tried to attend Flock's own Atlanta conference, the door got shut in his face. According to the Verified Privacy VPN breakdown, Flock closed Flock Forward to press and allegedly yanked a hotel reservation tied to a critic who'd paid to be there like anyone else.

A company that insists recording the public is harmless apparently doesn't want the same treatment applied to its own trade show. That's not a legal argument, it's a tell. If your product and your business practices can withstand scrutiny, you let cameras and reporters in the room. If they can't, you gatekeep a $350 ticket and quietly disinvite the one person in the room who's been asking hard questions in public for two years.

Credit to Verified Privacy VPN for digging into this — it's the kind of accountability reporting that surveillance companies rarely face, and it matters because Flock's cameras are spreading into thousands of towns with little public debate. If you want to see how close this is to your own neighborhood, check our camera map, and if you're ready to push back at your next city council meeting, our take-action page has what you need.