The chief executive of a controversial surveillance-camera company has drawn his wife into an escalating privacy controversy after leaked audio revealed him saying she had advised him to “never apologize.”
Garrett Langley, CEO of Flock Safety, made the comments at a private meeting of police chiefs in Orlando, Florida, on Sunday, according to audio obtained by 404 Media.
Flock has faced mounting criticism over its nationwide network of license plate-reading cameras. During the gathering, Langley dismissed much of the opposition, claiming protests against the company were not authentic and suggesting Russian bots were responsible for a significant share of the online backlash.
“I give my wife a lot of credit. She was, like, you should never apologize,” Langley said, according to the outlet.
“Sure, people make mistakes. I’ve made a lot of mistakes in the last nine years. I made a lot of mistakes this summer. But we do good work.”
Langley apologized in July to activists who had protested Flock after he previously described their group as a “terroristic organization,” Forbes reported.
He also said his wife had supported his theory that Russian bots were fueling the online criticism directed at Flock.
Leaked audio captured Flock Safety CEO Garrett Langley claiming his wife had told him to “never apologize”
Langley was photographed with his wife at a technology conference in Idaho earlier this year
“It went down 50 percent last week when Ukraine bombed a Russian data center with a drone. Literally 50 percent overnight,” Langley said.
“And so look, I’m the last person, my wife as well, she’s like ‘This is crazy, these people are getting paid to say these things.’”
Langley offered no evidence for the claims about alleged Russian bot activity.
The CEO acknowledged that what he described as inauthentic online activity had contributed to genuine protests from activists.
“Inorganic activity has led to organic activity, but when I look at protests across the country, it is the same people with the same signs and the same message,” Langley said.
“That’s not normal. That’s not organic at all.”
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Langley also told attendees that he would prefer to avoid speaking with the media altogether.
“I’d like to never do media again if that’s possible,” he said.
“The media gets to say whatever they want to say about you,” Langley added at another point.
Flock surveillance cameras have come under fire from civil liberties campaigners concerned about privacy
The comments come as privacy advocates warn that Flock’s surveillance network could create a searchable record of people’s day-to-day driving patterns and movements.
Flock has acknowledged that it has deployed around 100,000 cameras across America, according to the BBC.
The roadside devices photograph passing vehicles and record their license plates, locations and precise time of travel, allowing separate sightings to be pieced together into a detailed journey.
While police say the technology helps locate stolen vehicles and criminal suspects, civil liberties groups argue that innocent motorists can also be swept into the system and their movements searched without officers first obtaining a warrant.
Concerns have intensified amid allegations that officers used the system to monitor former partners and cases in which incorrect alerts allegedly led to innocent motorists being detained.
The company says information is deleted after 30 days by default, although retention periods can vary under local contracts and state laws. Flock also maintains that its customers control access to their information and that searches are logged and can be audited.
Flock has acknowledged that it has deployed around 100,000 cameras across America
However, a growing number of American communities are imposing restrictions on the technology or abandoning the company altogether.
The American Civil Liberties Union said in June that more than 55 communities had ended Flock contracts during the previous year, citing fears that the technology could enable warrantless surveillance, federal access to locally collected records and searches without sufficient municipal oversight.
The Daily Mail has reached out to Flock Safety for comment.