About Flock Safety
Flock Safety was founded in 2017 by Garrett Langley, Matt Feury, and Paul Cameron, building a network of camera-based sensors, most prominently automated license plate readers, that municipalities, neighborhoods, and businesses can install to automatically capture and record vehicles passing through a given area, creating a searchable record that police departments and other authorized users can query when investigating crimes, such as searching for a vehicle matching the description of one involved in a specific incident across camera locations throughout a jurisdiction.
Flock's cameras are designed to be relatively simple and inexpensive to install compared to some earlier-generation license plate recognition systems, often solar-powered and connected wirelessly rather than requiring extensive electrical and network infrastructure work, which has helped the company achieve very rapid adoption among thousands of police departments, homeowners associations, and business districts across the United States seeking to add camera-based crime deterrence and investigative tools without the cost and complexity of more traditional surveillance camera network installations. The company has expanded its sensor offerings beyond license plate recognition to include gunshot detection sensors and other public safety technology, and has built a searchable network that, in some markets, lets law enforcement agencies query camera data across jurisdictional boundaries, an increasingly discussed and debated capability given questions about data sharing, retention policies, and appropriate oversight of a rapidly growing distributed surveillance network. Flock Safety's rapid growth and widespread camera deployment has drawn both strong support from many law enforcement agencies and communities citing crime reduction benefits, and significant criticism and legal challenges from civil liberties organizations and some local governments concerned about mass surveillance, data privacy, potential misuse for purposes such as immigration enforcement, and insufficient public oversight of how the growing camera network's data is used, shared, and retained. The company has raised very substantial venture funding from investors including Andreessen Horowitz, Tiger Global, and Bain Capital Ventures, reaching a valuation exceeding $7.5 billion.
