Japanese Company Creates Technology That Can Predict Crimes
Even though it sounds like it’s veering into the realm of witchcraft, people have been able to make predictions for ages. Stats and probability have calculated the odds for a good while, whether it’s to tell who will strike out at the plate or how much rain will fall. But now the power of science is out to take predictions as close to magic as possible — and sniff out crimes before they even happen.
The Japanese company Hitachi is well-known for things like TVs and projectors, but it’s recently branched out to develop the Hitachi Visualization Predictive Crime Analytics, or PCA system. By stockpiling and studying data from up-to-date weather reports, maps, and social media conversation, it can potentially pinpoint where crime scenes occur — and on top of that, label the crime with a specific threat level. The system’s reliance on statistics, in theory, could make it superior to human police officers — though it’s a safe bet that the officers will still be the ones responding for the time being.
One concern that detractors have had is how well the PCA is going to work when it doesn’t have that human element do decide what could cause a crime and what couldn’t — assuming it works as intended, of course. We might have the answer to that, though; a trial run in several cities is scheduled to start soon, so the system may get a definitive chance to prove the future is here.
