AOC slams NYPD s $75,000 robotic police dog named Digidog as racist - saying it prowls the streets only in low-income communities of color
Democratic firebrand AOC blasted the police department s four-legged Digidog in a succession of Thursday tweets after it was deployed in the Bronx
Ocasio-Cortez appeared to accuse the NYPD of racism for deploying the device for testing on low-income communities of color with under-resourced schools
She also argued that police funding that allows for new technology like the Digidog would have better served if it had been allotted to education or housing
Digidog, which was designed by Boston Dynamics and has a starting price of around $75,000, joined the NYPD last year and was used in a call Tuesday
The New York Police Department has been testing Digidog, which it says can be deployed in dangerous situations and keep officers safer, but some fear it could become an aggressive surveillance tool.
Minneapolis passes restrictive ban on facial recognition use by police, others Council contends the victory for privacy advocates also protects people of color. February 12, 2021 6:17pm Text size Copy shortlink:
Citing concerns about its reliability and potential to harm communities of color, the Minneapolis City Council voted Friday to ban the use of facial recognition technology by police and other city agencies.
In doing so, the city joined places like Portland, Ore., Boston and Alameda, Calif., that have already outlawed or limited use of the technology, which employs complex algorithms to automatically detect human faces from surveillance cameras, social media and other sources and match them to names. Research has found that the software sometimes has trouble correctly identifying Black and Latino people.
25 January 2021 17:37 GMT
Minneapolis is considering a ban on most uses of facial recognition technology by its police and other municipal departments.
A proposal, which has been quietly discussed for months among a coalition of progressive groups including the American Civil Liberties Union, was signed off on without discussion by a City Council committee Thursday. The matter will next be taken up at a public comment session on Feb. 10 before going to the full council for a final vote on Feb. 12.
If successful, the motion could signal a wave of reforms over the use of military and surveillance equipment following the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police.