Incident 98: N.Y.P.D. Robot Dog’s Run Is Cut Short After Fierce Backlash

Description: The New York Police Department canceled a contract to use Boston Dynamics' robotic dog Spot following public backlash.

Tools

New ReportNew ReportNew ResponseNew ResponseDiscoverDiscoverView HistoryView History
Alleged: Boston Dynamics developed an AI system deployed by New York City Police Department, which harmed New York City low-income communities.

Incident Stats

Incident ID
98
Report Count
1
Incident Date
2021-04-28
Editors
Sean McGregor, Khoa Lam

CSETv1 Taxonomy Classifications

Taxonomy Details

Harm Distribution Basis

none

Sector of Deployment

law enforcement

N.Y.P.D. Robot Dog’s Run Is Cut Short After Fierce Backlash
nytimes.com · 2021

The Police Department will return the device earlier than planned after critics seized on it as a dystopian example of overly aggressive policing.

When the Police Department acquired a robotic dog last year, officials heralded the four-legg…

Variants

A "variant" is an incident that shares the same causative factors, produces similar harms, and involves the same intelligent systems as a known AI incident. Rather than index variants as entirely separate incidents, we list variations of incidents under the first similar incident submitted to the database. Unlike other submission types to the incident database, variants are not required to have reporting in evidence external to the Incident Database. Learn more from the research paper.