Story summary
YouTube host Benn Jordan, who has been critical of the surveillance company Flock Safety, was kicked out of their convention in Atlanta after he downloaded the conference app and exposed a data breach that revealed the entire guest list. In response, Jordan set up his own radio equipment and drone outside the convention hall to unmask attendees and listen in on microphones inside. He also noted that Flock Safety claims police customers don't need a warrant to use their automated license plate reading cameras because drivers have "no reasonable expectation of privacy" on public roads.
The controversy surrounding Flock Safety has been ongoing, with some critics warning about the potential for state tyranny and others arguing that the company's surveillance technology is necessary to keep communities safe. However, many experts are cautioning against losing sight of what truly matters: passing strong legal protections that outlive Flock Safety's dominance.
Flock Safety has 120,000 cameras across 49 states, working with over 5,000 law enforcement agencies and capturing more than 20 billion license plate scans every month. Despite the controversy surrounding the company, competitors are watching and waiting to potentially take advantage of any infrastructure left behind after the public-relations backlash subsides.
In a bizarre twist, some police departments have even started warning drivers about the potential risks of displaying stickers on their cars that reveal sensitive information about their lives, such as school names or extracurricular activities.
Written for “Flock Smart Doorbell Controversy” on 2026-08-31,
grounded in this article and the 3 other(s) covering the same event.
The surveillance contractor Flock Safety argues that police customers don't need a warrant to track drivers with its automated license plate reading cameras because drivers have "no reasonable expectation of privacy" on public roads.
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drivers → argue → roads
So YouTube host Benn Jordan applied the same logic back on Flock.
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Jordan → apply → Flock
He sat outside Flock's recent police convention in Atlanta with radio equipment and a drone, which he used to unmask attendees and even listen to microphones inside the convention hall.
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he → sit → hall
"Flock values their privacy.
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Flock → value → privacy
Oh well," Jordan wrote in the title of his video on the convention.
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Jordan → write → convention
His plans didn't quite start out that way.
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plans → start → ?
Jordan, an early and outspoken critic of Flock, wanted to visit the convention to see what the relationship between police and the company was like after a string of cases in Georgia involving police misusing Flock products, he tells Reason.
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he → want → Reason
After downloading the conference app, he looked inside the source code and found that it revealed the entire guest list.
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it → download → list
Jordan alerted Flock to the data breach.
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Jordan → alert → breach
Once the company caught wind that Jordan was coming, it canceled his tickets.
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it → catch → tickets
But the attempts to keep Jordan out went further than that.
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attempts → keep → that
An employee from Flock called the hotel to cancel Jordan's room reservation, which he had booked himself, according to a video Jordan posted of a call with the hotel.
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Jordan → call → hotel
(Flock did not respond to Reason's request for comment.)
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Flock → respond → comment
Jordan even found out that all of the rest of the rooms and even the parking lots surrounding the hotel had been booked.
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all → find → hotel
Still, he was able to find a public parking spot within view of the hotel, where he parked a van with dozens of WiFi adapters, a parabolic dish antenna, and a dipole array.
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he → find → adapters
This equipment picked up the signal from the convention hall's wireless microphones, allowing Jordan to hear attendees' conversations.
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Jordan → pick → conversations
"Everything was on public channels," he says.
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he → say → channels
Then he used a drone to photograph attendees walking out and used facial recognition to figure out their identities.
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he → use → identities
Ironically, government regulations helped Jordan with his surveillance, because the Federal Communications Commission limits wireless microphones to broadcast on very specific frequencies.
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Commission → help → frequencies
Although it's within a private company's right to choose who can and can't come to its conference—and Jordan acknowledges that keeping outsiders away from the hotel can be a reasonable security measure—many of the attendees were police officials, presumably attending on the taxpayer dime.
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many → choose → dime
While Flock and its police customers are happy to erode the expectation of privacy in everyday life, they carve out ultra-private spaces for themselves.
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they → erode → themselves
Indeed, Jordan is careful not to reveal anything he picked up from his radio surveillance, telling Reason that the point was simply to show that it could be done.
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it → reveal → Reason
"Public officials should know that you can't go to a private thing where journalists aren't allowed and not expect anybody to fly a drone from public view.
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anybody → know → view
You should be a little unsettled about going to something like that," Jordan adds.
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Jordan → go → that
He says that he's ultimately happy that his stunt drew attention to the lack of transparency.
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stunt → say → transparency
Although automatic license plate readers have been raising privacy concerns for years, the growth of Flock is particularly alarming because the company plugs police departments around the country into a central database that isn't subject to court orders or the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution.
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that → raise → Constitution
Police officers have been caught using Flock data to stalk romantic interests.
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officers → catch → interests
One woman spent two weeks in jail, and another was detained at gunpoint because of mistaken identifications from Flock cameras.
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another → spend → cameras
The American public is becoming increasingly hostile to these cameras.
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public → become → cameras
At least 56 cities and towns have ended their Flock contracts in 2026 over privacy concerns.
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cities → end → concerns
Ring, a doorbell camera company owned by Amazon, also canceled its planned partnership with Flock over public backlash.
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Ring → own → backlash
More alarmingly, citizens have started vandalizing the cameras.
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citizens → start → cameras
Jordan, whose YouTube channel covers eclectic science topics from animal hearing to modern train synthesizers, accidentally found himself at the forefront of the movement against Flock.
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channel → cover → Flock
He saw mysterious new cameras in his neighborhood early last year, followed his instincts to reverse engineer everything, and found security vulnerabilities allowing anyone to access Flock footage without a password.
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anyone → see → password
In response to Jordan's video, Flock CEO Garrett Langley sent officials around the country a letter in December 2025 claiming that "Flock has never been hacked" and is "under coordinated attack…from the same activist groups who want to defund the police, weaken public safety, and normalize lawlessness."
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who → send → lawlessness
The city of Staunton, Virginia, published the letter in its announcement that it was ending its relationship with Flock.
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it → publish → Flock
Although he hasn't gotten any response for his surveillance of the Flock conference, Jordan tells Reason that he's had police show up outside his house "and just blast their siren" in the past.
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police → get → past
He claims he also spotted a private investigator (who is unlicensed and a convicted felon) hanging around his house, but couldn't figure out who hired them.
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who → claim → them
Despite the unwanted attention, Jordan has continued speaking to city councils and police departments around the country.
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Jordan → continue → country
While he says that he would prefer no license plate tracking to begin with, he has been pitching a solution to cities that are going to do it anyway: locally owned cameras feeding into locally owned databases that police need a warrant from a judge to access.
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police → say → judge
…and 3 more, not listed.
