This AI claims to predict crimes before they happen based on real-time CCTV analysis

Calculate risks: Although the concept dates back to earlier literary works and philosophical discussions, the idea of ​​authorities preventing crimes before they happen was brought into the mainstream by the movie Minority Report. Now, thanks to researchers in South Korea, this vision may soon become a reality. The country's Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute has unveiled “Dejaview” – an AI system that analyzes video surveillance footage to detect and potentially prevent criminal activity.

Dejaview uses machine learning to analyze patterns and detect signs of impending crime, taking into account factors such as time of day, location, previous incident records, and other variables to assess the risk of a suspicious event.

According to a report by TechXplore, the core technology works in two ways. First, there is a time/space-based prediction model that evaluates factors such as whether a crime has previously occurred in a remote area late at night.

For example, if a quiet, remote location has similar environmental factors to those that have occurred in the past during a nighttime crime, the system assumes there is a high risk of another incident occurring.

Authorities can then proactively monitor these high-risk zones more closely using CCTV feeds to prevent incidents before they happen and position response teams accordingly. In field tests using local data from Seocho City, this “predictive crime mapping” system showed an accuracy of 82.8%.

The second component of Dejaview is called “individual recidivism prediction.” It focuses on people who are considered “high risk” of repeating the same crimes. By tracking their movement patterns, the technology can analyze whether their behavior indicates that they may soon commit another crime.

How Dejaview gained its intelligence is evident in the fact that the technology was trained on a huge dataset of over 32,000 CCTV clips recording various incidents over a period of three years. The AI ​​learned to recognize patterns from this data and now applies this “knowledge” to live scenarios.

Of course, the Orwellian implications of AI-powered crime prediction are sure to spark debate, especially when it comes to tracking individuals. For now, ETRI seems to limit the application of Dejaview to public security infrastructure such as airports, energy plants, factories, and monitoring national events. Commercial use for specialized security agencies is expected by the end of 2025.

South Korea is not the only country exploring this technology. Argentina has also set up a new AI unit that aims to prevent, detect, investigate and prosecute criminals using special algorithms. Argentina is taking this a step further by analyzing data that goes beyond video surveillance, including social media, websites and even the dark web.