Flock Safety sells AI cameras built to hunt people. These systems track faces, zoom automatically on arguments, follow lone joggers, log every license plate, and archive full routines. Cities across the country throw millions in taxpayer money to cover neighborhoods, playgrounds, trails, and parking lots with them. Then Flock left dozens of those feeds wide open on the internet. No password. No login. No encryption. Search engines indexed them. Any pedophile or stalker with basic search skills could find live streams, download 31-day archives, and remotely control the pan-tilt-zoom to follow specific targets.
Benn Jordan discovered this. He documented nearly 70 exposed Condor cameras nationwide with help from researcher John Gaines, and released the proof in his video titled This Flock Camera Leak is like Netflix for stalkers. He shared the evidence with 404 Media, who verified everything. The feeds had been wide open for 31 days. No password. No encryption. No logging. Anyone could watch live, download archives, or delete evidence with a button press.
Benn even offered to personally fund security research into Flock's systems. They never responded. That silence tells you everything. Companies that give a shit about child safety respond to researchers. Companies protecting their stock price ghost them.
A playground camera streamed children to the internet
One camera pointed directly at an unattended playground near the Bay Area. Children played there every day while the feed streamed live to the open internet. Full 31-day archives sat ready for download. No barrier. No credentials. No logging of who accessed it or what they did with the footage.
Child predators spend years hunting exactly this kind of material. Flock handed it to them with zero effort required, zero risk, and zero way to trace who was watching or downloading. Flock was already surveilling those children without consent or notification, filming them for government databases while pretending it was for neighborhood safety. Then they left that footage streaming to the internet for pedophiles to catalog.
They built the surveillance infrastructure. They deployed it at playgrounds. They failed to secure it. They ignored the researcher who found it. Every single decision in that chain is Flock's responsibility.
Every other feed was stalker infrastructure
Woman jogging alone on a secluded Georgia forest trail. Multiple cameras tracked her route. Same time. Every morning. Archived. Man leaving his New York home at predictable intervals. Trackable down to the minute. Logged. Couple arguing at a street market in Atlanta while AI zoom tracks their faces and stores the fight.
Benn used commercial facial recognition and found one had just finished medical school. The other was dealing with chronic IBS. They had a baby last year. Their debt-to-income ratio was concerning. He knew they drove 45 minutes from the suburbs to attend church that morning, then went to the market and bought a sweater. All from publicly accessible footage and open-source intelligence.
Family loading their infant and merchandise into a vehicle at a North Carolina Lowe's. Cross-reference their plate with the ParkMobile data breach and you have the address where those tools are stored. Man on a forest trail taking a break from rollerblading to watch videos on his phone. How did Benn know what was on the screen? The AI zoomed in automatically.
Pan-tilt-zoom tracking removes effort. Archive access enables pattern analysis. An observer does not need to be present to build a complete routine. Exact times someone is alone. Precise routes. Full vulnerability maps. Stalkers do not need to follow targets when the cameras do it automatically. They do not need to memorize schedules when the archive stores every pattern. They got finished profiles without leaving their chairs.
Flock built this. Flock sold this. Flock left it open.
The AI did reconnaissance for predators
Flock's cameras do not just record passively. The AI decides what matters. It detects faces, flags arguments, zooms on phones to see what people are reading, and follows people across the frame without human input. It zoomed tight on a couple's argument. It tracked a man's phone screen to reveal he was watching rollerblading videos. It followed individuals automatically and stored their patterns.
When a predator or stalker accesses that feed, they are not watching raw footage. They are watching footage that has already been curated by AI. Faces zoomed. Movement tracked. Behavior flagged. Phones readable. The system does the creep's work for them.
Flock designed it that way. They marketed it as cutting-edge AI surveillance. They bragged about the tracking capabilities. Then they left it accessible to anyone with a search bar. That is not negligence. That is recklessness bordering on intent.
Cities funded it on worthless promises
Cities approved these contracts based on Flock's assurances. Councils signed massive deals. Tax dollars paid for the rollout. Homeowner associations chipped in extra funding. Flock promised cutting-edge security, privacy protections, and AI-powered safety. They told cities the devices were secure after deployment. They claimed vulnerabilities only affected lab equipment, not real cameras. They compared their security to iPhones connected to the cloud.
They were saying all of this while feeds remained publicly accessible and researchers were documenting the exposure. Nobody required security audits because Flock positioned themselves as the experts. Nobody demanded independent verification because Flock sold confidence.
This was paid for with public money. Approved by elected officials who believed the pitch. Deployed without oversight because Flock said oversight was unnecessary. And left streaming to the internet while Flock collected subscription fees and issued reassurances that turned out to be worthless.
Flock calls it a limited misconfiguration
Nearly 70 cameras were wide open across multiple states. Live feeds. Full 31-day archives. Remote control access. File paths visible. Evidence deletable with a button press. All indexed by commercial search engines. Some feeds stayed accessible even after Flock told cities the issues were resolved.
This was not a limited misconfiguration. This was systemic failure to implement basic security on a surveillance platform filming children. The cameras are still there. They still record playground kids. They still track solo runners. They still archive routines for police and private clients who search without warrants.
The surveillance never stopped. The footage still exists. Flock still will not talk to the researcher who found the problem and offered to help fix it. They will not say how long the feeds were exposed. They will not say who accessed them. They will not say what was downloaded. They issue vague corporate reassurances while children remain in their cameras and their stock price stays protected.
Benn Jordan did this research ethically and transparently. He was visited by police. He believes private investigators photographed his home and bothered his neighbors. John Gaines, who helped find most of the vulnerabilities, lost his job within 48 hours of the video being released. These are the consequences of doing security research the right way while Flock protects their business instead of the people in their cameras.
Flock built a system that surveils children and vulnerable people without consent, then left it broadcast to predators. They marketed themselves as a safety company while building tools for stalkers. They sold cities on AI automation while ignoring basic authentication. They reassured councils their systems were secure while feeds streamed to the internet.
A researcher found their exposed feeds, documented the harm, offered to help, and got silence. Nobody has faced consequences. No executive has been charged. No contracts have been canceled. No city has demanded accountability. Flock is still selling cameras. Still filming playgrounds. Still profiting from mass surveillance they cannot be bothered to secure.
This is not a scandal about technology failing. This is a scandal about a company that does not give a shit about the people it films. Surveillance always creates power asymmetry. Flock's surveillance created opportunity for predators. And when that opportunity was exposed, Flock protected their business instead of the children in their cameras.
Credit: This Flock Camera Leak is like Netflix for stalkers Video by Benn Jordan, who showed his findings to 404 Media..
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FAQ
How many cameras were exposed
Benn Jordan documented over 60 Flock Safety Condor cameras with public live feeds and archives
Was playground footage accessible
Yes. One camera filmed an unattended Bay Area playground with live and archived video openly available
Could predators download the video
Yes. Full 30-day archives sat ready for download with no authentication or logging
Did Flock address the exposure
Flock claims it was a limited misconfiguration and public access ended after the report
Are the cameras still recording
Yes. They continue filming the same locations and archiving data for authorized clients