In an August call with Ohio law enforcement and government officials, Flock’s CEO Garrett Langley repeatedly lied about his surveillance technology’s role in tracking a woman who had self-administered an abortion, the context around the tracking of the woman, and 404 Media’s coverage of that watershed incident. Langley claimed that the story is “entirely false,” despite court records, police reports, and 404 Media’s other reporting documenting the case in detail.
The candid comments were recorded by
Signal Akron journalist Doug Brown
, who sat in on the call with an Ohio lawmaker and then shared them with 404 Media. The recording shows how Langley speaks in private with government officials when the conversation is not intended to be broadcast, and comes amid a PR campaign to recast his embattled company. Recently Langley has gone on something of a media blitz, speaking to outlets like
The New York Times

and appearing on the
tech-focused All-In Podcast
. Those conversations were, obviously, meant to be consumed publicly. Behind the scenes, Langley speaks very differently.
In the call, Langley strategized with cops about how to deal with journalists, suggesting that they avoid talking to national outlets and that cops focus on telling “sob” stories.
“Let me handle
The New York Times,
you handle your local media. They want to hear from you, you know your reporters, they’ll pick up a sob story,” Langley said.
💡
Do you work at Flock? I would love to hear from you. Using a non-work device, you can message me securely on Signal at joseph.404 or send me an email at joseph@404media.co.
“There’s a story reported by 404 Media of a Texas officer using Flock to try to find a woman who had an abortion. And it’s entirely false. They knew it was false. Because there’s a few things, right, because one, it’s not illegal to have an abortion in Texas. It’s illegal to administer an abortion. So the woman could never have been under investigation for having an abortion. So that’s

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