ShotSpotter (Shot Recognition System)

History

2024: Chicago System Abandonment

In late September 2024, the Chicago Police Department stopped using the ShotSpotter AI gunshot recognition system due to false positives to other loud sounds. Since the system was more often installed in deprived areas with a predominant black population, the police were accused of putting pressure on poor neighborhoods.

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson vowed to stop using ShotSpotter on his campaign trail in 2023, noting that false system positives were the reason for a disproportionate increase in searches in poor neighborhoods. The mayor suggested that the ShotSpotter system was ineffective, and the city lowered $100 million of taxpayers into the pipe by "buying walkie-talkies on a stick."

soundthinking.com

ShotSpotter is used in more than 160 cities across all states with at least 25,580 microphones installed, and nearly 70% of residents in neighborhoods equipped with ShotSpotter are black or Latino, according to the manufacturer. In Chicago, the ShotSpotter system has been in use since 2012, but in 2017 its area of ​ ​ operation expanded significantly when the city authorities deployed the system in poor areas. As of 2022, in one of these districts, blacks made up 75% of the population, and in the other, 95%.

Inspections in Chicago and New York have shown that the use of the technology rarely helps police arrest dangerous criminals. Of ShotSpotter's 50,176 confirmed alerts, only 9% involved gun crime, according to the report.

Jeremy Scott, who runs a project to monitor the use of tracking tools, said the ShotSpotter system violates the privacy of the poor and is a case of blatant discrimination on the basis of skin color and wealth.^[1]

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