Outlandish Security Industry Marketing Needs FTC Crackdown, Says S.T.O.P.

"Unsubstantiated, outlandish marketing claims" are an "endemic" problem posing a "threat to health and safety," citing claims from Axon, Clearview AI, Evolv, Flock, Verkada, etc., a new report from the Surveillance Technology Oversight Project calls for an FTC crackdown.

IPVM interviewed the authors and examined the report and its core argument that regulators should force the industry to meet higher standards in line with "other sectors that pose a serious threat to health and safety."

"Outlandish Marketing" is "Endemic" to Security Technology

The security technology market has repeatedly been harmed by false and misleading claims that waste millions of public money and put people at risk. Researchers from the Surveillance Technology Oversight Project (STOP) investigated this problem in a paper published on May 6, 2024, "Selling Surveillance: Fact vs. Ad Fiction."

STOP is a privacy and civil rights advocacy group focused on government use of surveillance and providing legal services for "those targeted by surveillance abuse."

The paper argues companies willing to sell technology "as the solution" to public safety challenges, whether it works or not, lead governments to "waste staggering sums." This means "social services with a more proven track record of reducing crime go underfunded:"

Seemingly no matter what public safety threats communities want to address, surveillance companies are there to sell their technology as the solution...all of this sales hype contributes to a climate where cities waste staggering sums on surveillance that often doesn’t work as expected. [emphasis added]

It can "create a false sense of safety" that causes real harm, which is why authors argue regulators should begin to apply higher standards to the sector similar to other industries that "market risky products must meet even more rigorous substantiation standards."

IPVM discussed STOP's paper with authors Eleni Manis and Corinne Worthington

Calls Out Various "Unsubstantiated, Outlandish Marketing Claims"

STOP's report calls attention to misleading marketing claims made by various industry actors, including from IPVM reports.

Examples include Flock's claims about crime reduction, Evolv's about performance and throughput, Clearview AI's about system accuracy, Verkada's about facial recognition use, Axon's about lethality rates, and others. IPVM has reported on many. See, for instance:

• Flock Responds To Forbes Investigation Alleging Illegal Activities and Exaggerated Study
• Why We Believe Evolv Express Is Not Actually Intelligent
• Problems Evolv School Customers Admit
• Evolv Violating FTC Rules, Refuses To Substantiate 10x Competitor Claim
• Facial Recognition-Based False Arrest Implicates Clearview AI, Reports NY Times
• Verkada Officially Admits Its Facial Recognition Is Facial Recognition

The issue, STOP points out, is that these are not isolated events but rather a broader industry problem. A variety of concerns stem from it, several of which we analyze below.

False Sense of Security

STOP said in its report that misleading claims pose a risk because they leave customers with "a false sense of safety," whereas social services have "a more proven track record of reducing crime":

Ineffective tools consume police budgets and can create a false sense of safety, with millions pouring into unproven technology while social services with a more proven track record of reducing crime go underfunded.

This raises an important question that often goes unaddressed in multi-million dollar purchases of systems like Evolv in schools: could the money be used more effectively elsewhere, such as on student counseling and mental health? In response to the shooting at Oxford School District, administrators installed Evolv (using a GiveEvolv grant), but an independent investigation found that proper risk assessment protocols could have stopped the shooting.

In their interview with IPVM, they specifically cited Evolv's false claims:

Bogus advertising ... gives communities, and possibly police, a false sense of security. For instance, not only does Evolv fail by misidentifying everyday objects as guns, it also fails to catch real weapons - weapons that don't contain iron, weapons that are below the threshold that Evolv sets so it doesn't have too many false positives. That gives schools and organizations that install these detectors a false sense that their communities are safe, when in fact the technology lets weapons through. [emphasis added]

This is an issue that IPVM has frequently raised with respect to Evolv. Evolv often criticizes us for publishing system limitations, saying that bad actors could use it to commit harm. But a false sense of security is not real security. People and places cannot take adequate steps to protect themselves if they do not know the limitations of the systems they use.

Wasted Spending

Another harm is runaway spending by police departments and city governments, who install systems advertised to work far more effectively than they actually do in practice:

Police departments now routinely spend tens of millions of dollars on a single surveillance tool, often without any independent verification of marketing claims

And STOP elaborated to us:

It's one of the reasons why this advertising is so dangerous. It gives police and communities a sense that they're really doing something to promote public safety, when in fact they're just spending millions on some technological boondoggle.

Says Providers Violating FTC Rules

STOP says that these various false and misleading claims run afoul of FTC rules:

The FTC prohibits “unfair and deceptive acts or practices in or affecting commerce.” Unlawful deception “involves information that is important to consumers” and is “likely to mislead customers acting reasonably under the circumstances.” Product representations are misleading if “the advertiser lacked a reasonable basis—or adequate substantiation—for asserting that the message was true.” This captures not only flat out lies, but conflicted, disingenuous and badly substantiated claims. The FTC additionally insists that comparative advertising be truthful.

And:

Companies don’t have to articulate falsehoods to be held accountable for bogus advertisements, either. By FTC standards, an advertisement is deceiving if it includes content “that is likely to mislead a consumer about the “nature, characteristics [or] qualities” of a product. Lastly, companies are liable for the statements made indirectly, through endorsers. Endorsements must “reflect [endorsers’] honest opinions, findings, beliefs, or experience.” Companies can’t use endorsers to misrepresent their products: statements “that would be deceptive if made directly by the advertiser” are off limits for endorsements as well.

Security Technologies Have Large Individual Impacts, Should be Held to High Standard

STOP points out that security technologies have largely escaped the "same scrutiny" from the FTC "as other sectors that pose a serious threat to health and safety." That, they say, is an oversight - security companies "hold Americans' lives in their hands" and should be held to the same standards:

While the FTC recently took a step to address surveillance advertising by questioning Evolv, the sector generally hasn’t faced the same scrutiny as other sectors that pose a serious threat to health and safety. In other industries, advertisements that market risky products must meet even more rigorous substantiation standards. The FTC applies a high standard to health and safety claims because they lead consumers to believe that a product is safe and healthy to use. In these cases, the FTC requires “competent and reliable scientific evidence” for substantiation, including objective evidence gathered by relevant professionals using accepted techniques “to yield accurate and reliable results." The same standards should apply to surveillance vendors, who also hold Americans’ lives in their hands. [emphasis added]

Problems with security products working poorly are an ongoing issue for users of technology and sellers, who are forced to compete in an unfair market, such as demonstrated by rigged fever cameras.

Urges FTC Action

STOP told us that the best solution is for the FTC to enforce its existing rules more stringently against the security industry. For now, they say, that should be sufficient even without making "industry-specific rules":

The FTC should start by enforcing existing rules against surveillance technology companies. And then they can get into making industry-specific rules. I think existing rules against false and misleading advertising are sufficient to curb the worst abuses in this space.

One goal of the paper, STOP told us, is to call attention to the issues in the space and spur awareness from regulators like the FTC:

Reports like ours hopefully will have somewhat of an effect in getting more coverage. What we and groups like IPVM have put out will hopefully draw more attention from the FTC about these issues. We see this with tech in general where technology develops so quickly, and it takes regulatory measures a lot of time to catch up. But this is something that's coming to the forefront and people are starting to understand that more. As long as people keep talking about it, that will hopefully bring the FTC into the equation, and hopefully they'll begin to take more action once they fully start to realize the extent of these problems.

Solicit Public Comment On Police/Government Contracts

STOP emphasized to us:

you need public feedback and democratic actors' feedback on surveillance tech. It's really important that before police contracts for surveillance technology are approved, or reapproved, that the public give feedback, that elected officials give feedback, and that they be able to press against what the technology is being used for and how effective it is, what it does, and what its civil rights implications are.

On the contrary, we see increasing power from large surveillance manufacturers who become increasingly close with government end users, with less oversight and more resistance to public scrutiny. Problems at and the defense by one of Evolv's largest end users shows that, e.g. Top Evolv School Customer Eliminating Students' Metal Ring Binders.

Consumer Education Important, But STOP Says Focus Must Be on Systemic Issues

STOP did note issues impacting individuals as well:

People are bringing these technologies into their home. It's not just police departments that are using this tech, so we really would like to expand our reach to help individuals understand the impact that these technologies have when they bring them home.

However, they also emphasized to us that this is largely a broader problem:

While we and our partner organizations do provide some cybersecurity support and some trainings for individuals who want to protect themselves from undue surveillance, we're always careful to stress that this is a societal issue that needs to be addressed at the city, state and federal level. It is not an individual's job to stop over policing. It's certainly not the job of people who are already overburdened by historical over-policing or who are in crisis to stop the widespread use of surveillance tech. So, while a group like STOP does provide advice for individuals like protesters who need to protect themselves, we will always stress that the solution has to come from the governmental level

Outlook

We support STOP's efforts to call for an FTC crackdown, as the security industry has shown minimal interest in policing itself or taking serious action against bad actors. While we believe most security manufacturers have good intentions and abide by ethical business practices, an aggressive minority disproportionately gains power and harms the public.

The industry should be encouraged by FTC's investigation into Evolv, and hopeful that this paper by STOP, along with rising calls from other public interest groups, will help improve security for the public and create a fairer security industry.