Old Westbury police testing AI-equipped body cameras capable of transcribing officers' interaction with public

Translating and speaking more than 50 foreign languages. Transcribing police interactions with the public. Answering on-the-spot policy questions.

Artificial intelligence-equipped body worn cameras could be doing all that soon at the Old Westbury police department.

Old Westbury Police Chief Stuart Cameron recently unveiled an AI-equipped body camera he is testing to Newsday reporters. He showed how the body camera with AI capabilities detects and translates Spanish and Russian. In a staged police encounter, he demonstrated how the technology automatically generates a draft police report, intended to be edited by a police officer. The department’s 800-page policy manual has been fed into the system so answers to questions regarding protocol pop up instantly on a computer with a link to the section in the manual. The camera will soon supply those policy answers, too, he said. 

“It’s not distracting, because you always have the body camera on, and all you have to do is press a button and you can keep your eyes up and be aware of the situation,” Cameron said. “It will be a game changer for public safety. ... This is really going to become so much more than a passive body camera."

His entire department of 28 is already outfitted with body worn cameras and the technology, powered by Axon, would be overlaid on the existing devices. Axon technology is used by more than 18,000 law enforcement agencies worldwide, including in cities like New York, according to Axon spokesperson Kristin Lowman.

While other police departments on Long Island use police cameras, it's unclear whether any currently employ AI. A spokesperson for the Suffolk County Police Department said in an email, "The department’s body-worn cameras do not utilize AI features; however, we are consistently reviewing available technology that would make policing duties more efficient." The NYPD said AI is not currently a feature on its body worn cameras. Nassau County police did not respond to an email inquiring about AI use. 

Time-saving tool

In addition to being a time-saving tool for officers completing police reports, it is an important safety tool during emergencies, Cameron said. The department oversees major roads that include sections of the Long Island Expressway and Jericho Turnpike and when officers are responding to accidents and trying to determine from a non-English speaker whether there is someone trapped in a car, seconds are critical, he said.

“A lot of times if you’re in a dangerous situation, and you don't have the opportunity to be able to call for a translator or use a telephonic translation service, you just want to be able to say something to somebody and get the message across, which this allows you very easily,” he added.

The AI features he’s considering for his department do not include facial recognition or biometrics but could include analytics or other capabilities down the road, Cameron said.

While proponents of police body worn cameras say they have become a useful tool in increasing transparency and accountability between police and the public, some people cite bias concerns and lack of proper oversight when it comes to the body cameras’ evolving AI capabilities.

Elizabeth Nevins, the director of the Hofstra Law Defender Clinic, which primarily represents indigent clients in Nassau County, said while the AI body camera’s translation services are helpful, transcriptions of police interactions with the public are only valuable if analyzed. “Unwatched video or unread transcripts, that's like a tree falling in a forest with no one around to hear it. But if it's used as a tool for at least providing some supervision and training for officers, that's probably better,” she said.

Civil rights concerns

Bias issues, she said, are less of a factor in transcription or translation services but she believes there is still a risk.

“Technology in general is not a silver bullet for solving all problems, and AI in particular, we know reinforces existing biases in the world," said Nevins, who is also a law professor at Hofstra University.

Daniel Schwarz, senior privacy and technology strategist at the New York Civil Liberties Union, said in an emailed statement that New York must enact legislation with strict parameters on AI use before allowing police to write reports with it.

“When police departments use unregulated AI technology to generate police reports, people’s civil rights are immediately put at risk,” Schwarz said. “AI report-writing technology is still untested, unreliable, and too opaque — and its use to generate police reports strips away essential safeguards from police procedures and introduces serious risks of error and bias.”

Christopher Herrmann, an associate professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice who has evaluated body camera policy for several police departments in the United States and in the U.K., said the mystery behind precisely how AI works could be sparking some fears but believes the AI tools Old Westbury is considering could make police work more efficient. It simply takes an existing video recording and transcribes the audio into a word document, Herrmann said.

“It's so simple, fast and easy. It makes the cops’ report writing a lot more accurate and a lot more efficient,” Herrmann said. “It’s not there to profile people or identify people as dangerous or not dangerous.”

 “There’s always the unknown of AI. We don’t know what’s under the hood so we’re just trusting it works and it’s tested and verified. I’m sure supervisors are going through these. With any major incident there will be several levels of oversight,” said Herrmann, a former crime analyst supervisor with the NYPD. 

For his part, Cameron called the tool “revolutionary,” for the public and cops. It's just a matter of reviewing the final cost, which he hopes will be covered by federal and local grant funding. 

"Everything has a cost-benefit analysis. Is this feature worth the amount of money versus something else that I could buy?" Cameron said. He will be expanding his test of the devices before making any final decisions.