A Flock Safety license-plate camera, which was stolen, revealed around 1.6 million images after hackers dismantled and reverse-engineered the device. However, Jason Brown, a former Secret Service cybercrime expert, believes this incident did not compromise Flock’s larger cloud network.
Brown, who is now the director of customer advisory and counter-fraud at the threat intelligence firm iCOUNTER, has 25 years of experience in cybercrime with the U.S. Secret Service. He emphasized that the key difference between accessing a stolen camera and breaching Flock’s network is significant.
“The most important point, I want to stress, is that Flock was never compromised,” Brown stated. “There was no massive leak of information from their network.”
According to reports, hackers physically removed a Flock camera from its position and managed to reverse-engineer it, finding both encrypted and unencrypted data on the device. They even recovered an encryption key that allowed them to access more data.
“Essentially, this was a case of someone taking the camera off the pole, taking it home, and then dissecting it,” Brown explained. “This did not enable them to log into Flock’s cloud, and nothing in the core of Flock was compromised.”
Reports show that the stolen logs covered about 21 days’ worth of activity, yielding 1.6 million images, 50,200 vehicle records, and 27,000 short videos. Flock cameras are designed to capture images and short clips of vehicles, which are then processed and stored in a cloud for search by authorized law enforcement users.
Brown further described the situation as a standalone incident, separate from past concerns where some cameras were briefly accessible from the internet due to security weaknesses. “Those are isolated events that do not indicate a systemic issue with Flock,” he noted.
He also mentioned that the company has since improved its security protocols, stating that approximately 97% of law enforcement agencies using Flock now employ multi-factor authentication.
When it comes to privacy, Brown asserted that having a Flock camera nearby shouldn’t change how people behave in public. “Should someone act differently because of a Flock camera? I would argue no,” he remarked.
While Brown acknowledged that the incident highlights broader cybersecurity issues, especially regarding third-party risks, he maintained that the integrity of Flock’s systems remains intact. He expressed concern about the implications of rapidly evolving artificial intelligence on security practices.
He ended on a note about the importance of proactive collaboration with third parties to ensure security before incidents arise, emphasizing that in an age of AI, risks are constantly evolving.
FOX Business has sought comment from Flock regarding this matter.
