Ben Jordan at Flock Forward: public‑airwave surveillance framed as journalism and activism

Ben Jordan attempted to attend Flock's annual conference 'Flock Forward' in Atlanta after buying a $350 ticket and booking the Hilton, but was denied entry and — per the transcript — 'a Flock employee canceled his hotel room'. Barred from the event, Jordan pivoted to systematic, lawful observation of public airwaves and peripherals around the convention. He captured packets from 'every single Wi‑Fi channel' using 'dozens of Wi‑Fi adapters in monitor mode', used a 2.4 gigahertz parabolic dish antenna to passively collect Bluetooth metadata, and employed a log periodic dipole array and multiple SDRs to demodulate stage and camera wireless microphones (including off‑air mingling audio). He also flew a drone with a zoom lens and applied facial recognition to identify attendees.

Using those methods, Jordan identified Minnesota Senator Julian Ortman and traced his connection to Public Safety Strategies Group, led by Rich Stanik, the former sheriff of Hennepin County covering Minneapolis, and alleges Flock pays them as consultants to surface leads for police contracts. Jordan frames his work explicitly as activism and journalism: 'I've exposed nothing this is activism', and argues that information broadcast on public airspace is public in the same way that standing in the street and shouting is public.

The speaker praises Jordan's creativity and legal awareness, emphasizing that both Jordan's tactics and Flock's surveillance practices are lawful as currently constituted. The speaker's central policy takeaway is concrete: the solution is to change statutes — 'pass privacy laws' — because vendor business models like 'Flock Safety' are 'predicated on mass surveillance'. The episode is presented as a demonstration that public‑safety vendor conferences and the devices they promote deserve public scrutiny and legislative attention.