Will “Minority Report” become reality? Harald Lesch on AI in crime detection

In reference to works such as “Minority Report” and its visionary portrayal of future crime fighting, the new ZDF sci-fi series “Concordia” discusses the concept of a highly developed AI that prevents crime by continuously evaluating people's emotions. The series, which has been available in the ZDF media library since September 14, portrays a Swedish city that is free of crime thanks to seamless AI surveillance by analyzing and evaluating feelings such as fear, joy or sadness.

The vision of an AI that recognizes our deepest desires, perhaps even before we are aware of them, seems futuristic, but how close are we to this reality? Harald Lesch looks for answers and looks, for example, at the city of Mannheim, which is looking for solutions to its high crime rate.

In order to enable 24-hour video surveillance that does not violate personal rights, faces must not be scanned. Instead, an AI that only analyses movement patterns could be helpful in distinguishing aggressive behaviour from harmless joy. But how is such an AI trained?