Liz González's neighborhood in East San Jose can be loud. Some of her neighbors apparently want the whole block to hear their cars, others like to light fireworks for every occasion, and occasionally there are gunshots. In February 2023, San Jose began piloting AI-powered gunshot detection technology from the company Flock Safety in several sections of the city, including Gonzalez's neighborhood. During the first four months of the pilot, Flock's gunshot detection system alerted police to 123 shooting incidents. But new data released by San Jose's Digital Privacy Office shows that only 50 percent of those alerts were actually confirmed to be gunfire, while 34 percent of them were confirmed false positives, meaning the Flock Safety system incorrectly identified other sounds--such as fireworks, construction, or cars backfiring--as shooting incidents. After Flock recalibrated its sensors in July 2023, 81 percent of alerts were confirmed gunshots, 7 percent were false alarms, and 12 percent could not be determined one way or the other.

The United States Justice Department (DOJ) is being asked to investigate whether a gunshot-detection system widely in use across the US is being selectively deployed to justify the over-policing of mainly Black neighborhoods, as critics of the technology claim. Attorneys for the nonprofit Electronic Privacy Information Center--a leading US-based civil liberties group--argue that "substantial evidence" suggests American cities are disproportionately deploying an acoustic tool known as ShotSpotter in majority-minority neighborhoods. Citing past studies, EPIC alleges that data derived from these sensors has encouraged some police departments to spend more and more time patrolling areas where the fewest number of white residents live--an allegation disputed by SoundThinking, the system's manufacturer. In a letter today to Merrick Garland, the US attorney general, attorneys for EPIC call for an investigation into whether cities using ShotSpotter are running afoul of the Civil Rights Act--namely, Title VI, which forbids racial discrimination by anyone who receives federal funds. "State and local police departments around the country have used federal financial assistance to facilitate the purchase of a slew of surveillance and automated decision-making technologies, including ShotSpotter," EPIC says.

SoundThinking, the company behind the gunshot-detection system ShotSpotter, is quietly acquiring staff, patents, and customers of the firm that created the notorious predictive policing software PredPol, WIRED has learned. In an August earnings call, SoundThinking CEO Ralph Clark announced to investors that the company was negotiating an agreement to acquire parts of Geolitica--formerly called PredPol--and transition its customers to SoundThinking's own "patrol management" solution. "We have already hired their engineering team," Clark said during the call, a transcript of which is public. He added that the acquisition of patents and staff would "facilitate our application of AI and machine learning technology to public safety." SoundThinking's absorption of Geolitica marks its latest step in becoming the Google of crime fighting--a one-stop shop for policing tools.