It is a crazy scenario: corporate employees you’ve never met watching live feeds of your child’s gymnastics class, not for security, but to impress potential customers. That’s exactly what happened in Dunwoody, Georgia, where Flock Safety workers accessed cameras in children’s spaces at the Marcus Jewish Community Center as part of sales demonstrations.
Despite learning about these intrusions, Dunwoody’s city council renewed their surveillance contract with Flock anyway.
The Access Logs Tell the Story
Public records reveal specific dates when Flock employees viewed sensitive locations for commercial purposes.
The details, uncovered through public records requests by resident Jason Hunyar, are unsettling. On July 23, 2025, Flock’s Randy Gluck viewed cameras labeled “Gym Mendel – 1” and “Main Pool Right.” On September 30, 2025, Vice President Bob Carter accessed the “Gymnastics” camera.
These weren’t security emergencies or system maintenance. They were sales pitches—Flock showing off their surveillance capabilities to prospective police department clients by streaming live footage of children.
Corporate Damage Control Mode
Flock’s apology and transparency promises ring hollow after the privacy breach discovery.
When the story broke, Flock CEO Garrett Langley personally apologized to the Jewish community center, acknowledging “poor judgement.” The company promised “radical transparency” and agreed to stop using Dunwoody footage for demonstrations.
But here’s the thing about radical transparency: truly transparent companies don’t need public records lawsuits to reveal they’re using your kids as sales props. Flock’s defense—that access was “authorized” by the city—misses the point entirely. Legal permission doesn’t make watching children appropriate commercial content.
Council Chooses Vendor Over Residents
Nearly three hours of public protest couldn’t sway officials committed to surveillance expansion.
Dunwoody residents packed April 2026 council meetings for almost three hours, voicing concerns about:
- Stalking
- ICE data sharing
- Protest surveillance
They demanded the city end its relationship with Flock entirely.
Instead, the council approved a renewed contract with what they called “guardrails”:
- The city owns the data
- Controls federal sharing
- Prohibits Flock from selling information
Mayor Lynn Deutsch expressed frustration with Flock’s actions but supported renewal anyway.
Your local government just told you that municipal surveillance partnerships matter more than your children’s privacy. The message is clear: once these systems embed themselves in city operations, getting rid of them becomes nearly impossible—even when vendors cross obvious ethical lines.
The Fallout Didn’t Stay in Dunwoody
Georgia kept finding new problems with Flock even after the contract was signed.
Dunwoody wasn’t an isolated case. In the weeks after the council vote, departments across Georgia started auditing their own Flock use after the company rolled out a new tool built to flag suspicious search patterns. That audit turned up more trouble. The Georgia Bureau of Investigation announced arrests of several more officers accused of misusing license plate reader data, adding to a string of similar cases that included five officers fired from the Albany Police Department.
By July, some Georgia residents had stopped waiting on public records requests and started going after the hardware directly. In Barrow County, about an hour northeast of Atlanta, someone took a saw to three camera poles along Double Bridges Road and cut the solar power lines feeding them. A fourth camera near Apalachee High School was damaged the same weekend. The sheriff’s office called it a felony under Georgia law and opened an investigation, but no suspects have been identified.
Then It Went National
Cities from Los Angeles to Houston started making the same choice Dunwoody faced.
The pattern spread past state lines fast. The Los Angeles Police Department let its three-year Flock contract expire on July 11, with Chief Information Officer Dean Gialamas citing “serious concerns around civil liberties and civil rights issues,” particularly who owns the data and how it gets shared. LAPD also said the cameras are not used for immigration enforcement, and Flock called the non-renewal a “surprise.”
Houston saw its own version of the Barrow County vandalism. Two cameras near Washington Avenue were cut in half and spray-painted, and two more turned up cut down near Memorial Park days later. Not every fight has gone the activists’ way, though. Harris County commissioners actually voted to expand Flock access countywide despite residents begging them to cancel the contract outright. The Texas Civil Rights Project pushed back hard, arguing the county still has no real safeguards on how officers search the system.
Dunwoody renewed its contract in April. Three months later, Flock is dealing with police departments walking away and residents taking matters into their own hands, all while defending the same “guardrails” argument that got it through that city council vote.
Update (July 14, 2026): The fallout from Flock’s Dunwoody demos has spread well beyond city limits. Georgia officers have been arrested in a wave of misuse cases, and vandals have cut down cameras in Barrow County and Houston. The Los Angeles Police Department let its Flock contract expire on July 11 over civil liberties and data ownership concerns, while Harris County commissioners voted to expand Flock access despite resident pushback. Full details above.
