The CEO of Flock Safety, the company that runs an enormous network of cameras used by police departments across the U.S., hasn’t been shy about taking on Flock’s critics. Last year, he even called one group that tracks the location of Flock cameras “terrorists.” But he’s had a change of heart. Or, at the very least, a change in PR strategy.
In 2025, Flock CEO Garrett Langley called people who opposed his company “terrorists,” according to Forbes, and has described the Deflock group as a “terroristic organization.” Deflock maintains an open source mapping project at deflocked.org that tracks over 115,000 cameras across the U.S.
“My comments were a mistake and I apologize,” Langley told Forbes in an article published Friday.
“There are groups today that have real valid criticisms of the business, and I think what’s changed for us is, as we’ve listened to them and heard them out, what we’re trying to do is find this balance. We believe in a world where we can have safety and privacy,” said Langley.
Activists have raised concerns about Flock’s work with local police departments and the expansion of its cameras. The company operates license plate readers used by police and denies that it tracks individual people, despite video demonstrations that clearly show otherwise. Flock also denies that it works with ICE, another concern among activists as the federal agency continues to terrorize local communities from Texas to Maine.
Flock didn’t respond to an email with questions Friday but it’s hard not to read Langley’s change of heart as more of a public relations push than a sincere change of heart. Far-right influencer Tucker Carlson criticized Langley on Wednesday by highlighting the CEO’s own words and use of “terroristic.”
“It’d be interesting to know where the douchebag factory is that turns out billionaires in t-shirts who run our most powerful companies. Who is that guy? He’s a billionaire,” Carlson said of the Flock CEO.
Carlson explained to his audience that Deflock is a group “that tells you where the flock cameras are,” and provides a map. “They’re not for Flock cameras or any license plate readers. They think they’re an invasion of your privacy. They’re dehumanizing. All true, by the way,” said Carlson. “But what they really do is keep track of where the monitors are. And so providing that information is terrorism, really?”
Carlson has never been afraid of embracing the most fascist impulses of the Trump-supporting right, but he also understands where the winds of populist public opinion are blowing. He gets that people don’t enjoy having 24/7 surveillance in their communities, especially if those cameras can be used to infringe on the rights of wealthy, white people.
And Langley seems to understand that he has a big task on his hands to convince the American public Flock cameras are for their own good, especially since so many people seem to be perfectly comfortable with vandalizing his cameras. Vigilantes frequently post videos to Reddit showing off their destruction.
Some cities have opted to cancel their contracts with Flock, including the Los Angeles Police Department which recently let its three-year contract with the surveillance company lapse. But the winds of public opinion can change quickly. If people just accept Flock without sustained push-back at the grassroots level, these kinds of companies become normalized and their CEOs have nothing to apologize for.
Flock’s CEO clearly feels the heat right now, as you can tell by his interview with Forbes. Langley says stuff like “we don’t have all the answers” and suggests that websites mapping the location of his cameras are acceptable.
“Assuming no one is committing a crime, it’s perfectly fine,” Langley told Forbes. One wonders whether he would’ve adopted this same attitude without push-back from the political right and people like Tucker Carlson or even widespread vandalism.
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