Cops pause use of flawed AI cameras secretly monitoring streets for suspects

New Orleans police have reportedly spent years scanning live feeds of city streets and secretly using facial recognition to identify suspects in real time—in seeming defiance of a city ordinance designed to prevent false arrests and protect citizens' civil rights. A Washington Post investigation uncovered the dodgy practice, which relied on a private network of more than 200 cameras to automatically ping cops' phones when a possible match for a suspect was detected. Court records and public data suggest that these cameras "played a role in dozens of arrests," the Post found, but most uses were never disclosed in police reports. That seems like a problem, the Post reported, since a 2022 city council ordinance required much more oversight for the tech. Rather than instantly detaining supposed suspects the second they pop up on live feeds, cops were only supposed to use the tech to find "specific suspects in their investigations of violent crimes," the Post reported. And in those limite ... Read full article.