Suffolk finalizing $4M deal with Flock Safety for gunshot detection sensors, but some are raising privacy concerns

Suffolk County is installing new gunshot technology from the same manufacturers of license plate camera readers that have sparked debate over privacy concerns.

The switch to Flock Safety broadens the company's surveillance system by linking its new gunshot detection with a nationwide network of license place readers, allowing police to quickly identify vehicles near a reported shooting, while critics question whether oversight and privacy protections are keeping pace.

The county has used ShotSpotter — similar technology that pinpoints the location of gunfire — in communities with the highest rates of gun violence for more than a decade. The acoustic sensors detect the sound of gunshots and notify police in instances where there are sometimes no 911 calls. 

Suffolk County is now finalizing a five-year, $3.79 million contract with Flock Safety for gunshot detection sensors across 23.5 square miles currently covered by ShotSpotter. Suffolk police would be among the first law enforcement agencies to install Flock Safety’s latest technology, whose pending contract was exempt from legislative approval.

Some lawmakers expressed reservations about Flock just as other legislators embraced the technology already in use for its ability to help police solve crime such as car thefts and illegal dumping. The new gunshot technology, which the county says it hopes to save money on, features additional capabilities compared to ShotSpotter with its ability to detect and differentiate gunshots, fireworks, car crashes, screams and street takeovers, officials said.

Experts say Flock's expansion into gunshot detection is a logical next step for the company and the tools can benefit law enforcement, while acknowledging there should be safeguards to protect against abuse. 

The contract also expands Flock's footprint across the county as the Atlanta-based firm has come under scrutiny for how it secures private data, leading to litigation and some police departments and municipalities nationally to retreat from using its license plate reader cameras.

Flock says customers like Suffolk control their own data, allowing agencies to choose who can access the collected data. The company also said it does not listen in on private conversations. 

Jed Painter, general counsel of the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office, negotiated parts of the contract and said in an interview Flock had been "aggressively trying to market" its new technology, which led to lower prices compared to ShotSpotter. Flock will cost about $800,000 less per year than ShotSpotter, now known as SoundThinking following a 2023 company rebrand.

The county’s contract with ShotSpotter expires Sept. 6. Painter said the goal is to begin deploying the Flock Audio Detection system in the next month or two.

The county’s RFP Waiver Committee, which approves requests for contracts that cut out the traditional competitive procurement process, allowed the Suffolk County Police Department to pursue the contract with a 3-0 vote at its April 15 meeting.

Pushback to Flock

Legis. Greg Doroski (D-Mattituck) said he began researching Flock based off feedback he’s received from community members in his North Fork district, and he feels the company "is being less than truthful with the capabilities of their system" and the control local municipalities have over its data. Opposition to cameras deployed on the North Fork has escalated recently to the point where Southold Town police said they are investigating several acts of vandalism against the devices.

Doroski said while the gunshot detection and license plate readers can be beneficial, there’s concern with how the technology can start in one direction "and then expand into another direction maybe without as much oversight as should be happening."

He said he was also concerned with the contract bypassing legislative approval through the waiver committee.

"As we look at rolling out this sort of technology, we need to have a robust public discussion about it," he said. "Sometimes those conversations are uncomfortable, but they’re absolutely necessary."

Daniel Schwarz, senior privacy and technology strategist for the New York Civil Liberties Union, said in a statement that local police departments across the state are "eagerly embracing expensive, error-prone technology under the guise of public safety."

Presiding Officer Anthony Piccirillo (R-Holtsville) told Newsday he has "a lot of serious questions about Flock" but did not have information about the gunshot detection contract. He said he needed to speak to legislative counsel when asked whether he's requested a Flock representative to testify before the legislature.

Skepticism of Flock has been noted in other parts of the country.

In Georgia, five former Albany Police Department officers were arrested this month for misuse of license plate reader technology that was uncovered through an audit, according to The Albany Herald.

San Francisco police last month announced an audit found 299 improper searches from federal and out-of-state law enforcement agencies, according to the San Francisco Chronicle. Those searches did not appear to be related to immigration enforcement, the paper reported.

A California law firm filed a class action complaint against Flock earlier this year for allegedly violating the state's privacy laws.

Garrett Langley, Flock Safety’s CEO, wrote a March 25 sole source letter to Suffolk police to substantiate the county’s claim that no other vendors could provide similar service.

"When a shooting is detected by Suffolk County’s audio sensors, FlockOS can surface plates captured by cameras operated by over 5,000 communities nationally," he wrote. The technology, Langley wrote, can connect a vehicle captured near a shooting in Suffolk to a previous shooting at any other location that uses Flock.

"No other vendor — audio or [license plate reader] — can replicate this cross-network intelligence because no other vendor operates this ecosystem," he wrote.

A spokesperson for Flock did not respond to additional questions submitted on how the company addresses privacy concerns.

In the sole source letter, Langley wrote that the system uses a "two-tier machine learning architecture," which can eliminate bias and court challenges.

"At no point does a human analyst at a private company listen to, review, or validate an audio event before an alert is generated," he wrote.

'We lost no quality'

Painter said the license plate readers and gunshot detection can work independently of each other, and the purchase "doesn’t tether us to buy any future Flock technology."

In a statement to Newsday, Suffolk Police Commissioner Kevin Catalina said the transition to Flock should be "seamless" and the technology will enable officers to "quickly identify and respond to potential shooting incidents, locating victims and suspects."

Painter said a trial was done as a comparison by setting up sensors in parallel to evaluate Flock versus ShotSpotter, and "we lost no quality."

Flock currently deploys license plate readers in conjunction with police departments, municipalities and private businesses across Long Island, including the Suffolk County Sheriff’s Office on the East End and Nassau County police.

In a statement to Newsday, SoundThinking said it has been "proud to partner with Suffolk County" and respects the county's decision-making process. Competitive comparisons, the company said, "have shown again and again that ShotSpotter is the gold standard."

Tracing every shot

Adam Wandt, associate professor of public policy at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in Manhattan, said he views the tools as a "net plus" under certain circumstances. He said there needs to be checks and balances, safeguards and transparency to prevent abuse.

Last October, District Attorney Ray Tierney provided an overview of the ShotSpotter program to the Suffolk Legislature’s Public Safety Committee.

"Our goal was every time a shot gets fired in Suffolk County that there is a police response," Tierney told lawmakers.

In 2022, Suffolk lawmakers approved funding for ShotSpotter after the program had been eliminated in 2018 by then-County Executive Steve Bellone. The county reversed positions to bring it back because of advancements in technology, Newsday previously reported.

The county began rolling out ShotSpotter in 2023 in communities such as Bellport, Central Islip, Coram and Huntington Station.

Jeremy Garretson, a Southold resident who's spoken out against Flock, said he began digging into the company after noticing the license plate readers becoming more common in Southold Town over the past year. He said he’s been pushing for independent oversight of the cameras, while understanding the technology is unlikely to be taken away entirely.

He said he sees privacy concerns as well with the gunshot detection and the potential for someone to use the microphones to listen in on an unsuspecting public.

"I think a heavily surveilled society does not create a happier society," he said.