Researchers at the University of Chicago have developed an algorithm that predicts crimes a week ahead within a radius of 300 meters with 90% accuracy. The work was published by a magazine Nature.
The system learns patterns from publicly available data on violent and property crimes, the scientists say. Such events are less prone to police bias, the researchers say.
The model isolates crime by looking at the temporal and spatial coordinates of individual events and discovering patterns to predict future incidents.
The algorithm divides the city into “spatial tiles” about 300 meters across and predicts crime in those areas.
The scientists said previous models relied more on traditional neighborhoods or political boundaries, which are subject to bias.
According to Ishanu Chattopadhyaya, lead author of the study, the tool’s high accuracy does not mean it should be used to guide law enforcement policy. He added that police departments should not use it to pre-emptively take over neighborhoods to prevent crime.
“It’s not magic; there are limitations, but we have tested it and it works very well,” Chattopadhyay said.
Instead, the algorithm should be added to the toolkit of urban policy and police strategies to fight crime, the scientist argues:
“We have created a digital twin of the urban environment. If you give him data about what happened in the past, he will tell you about the future,” he said.
The research team also looked into the response of the police to crime by analyzing the number of arrests after the incidents and comparing the rates in different areas.
They found that higher crime rates in wealthier neighborhoods led to more arrests. In disadvantaged areas, the situation is reversed, which may indicate an imbalance in the response of the police, scientists say.
The tool was tested using historical information from Chicago. The model also performed well with data from seven other US cities: Atlanta, Austin, Detroit, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Portland, and San Francisco.
Recall that in August 2021, the Pentagon tested a decision-making system capable of foreseeing events several days in advance.
In September, DeepMind developed a rain prediction algorithm.
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Researchers at the University of Chicago have developed an algorithm that predicts crimes a week ahead within a radius of 300 meters with 90% accuracy. The work was published by a magazine Nature.
The system learns patterns from publicly available data on violent and property crimes, the scientists say. Such events are less prone to police bias, the researchers say.
The model isolates crime by looking at the temporal and spatial coordinates of individual events and discovering patterns to predict future incidents.
The algorithm divides the city into “spatial tiles” about 300 meters across and predicts crime in those areas.
The scientists said previous models relied more on traditional neighborhoods or political boundaries, which are subject to bias.
According to Ishanu Chattopadhyaya, lead author of the study, the tool’s high accuracy does not mean it should be used to guide law enforcement policy. He added that police departments should not use it to pre-emptively take over neighborhoods to prevent crime.
“It’s not magic; there are limitations, but we have tested it and it works very well,” Chattopadhyay said.
Instead, the algorithm should be added to the toolkit of urban policy and police strategies to fight crime, the scientist argues:
“We have created a digital twin of the urban environment. If you give him data about what happened in the past, he will tell you about the future,” he said.
The research team also looked into the response of the police to crime by analyzing the number of arrests after the incidents and comparing the rates in different areas.
They found that higher crime rates in wealthier neighborhoods led to more arrests. In disadvantaged areas, the situation is reversed, which may indicate an imbalance in the response of the police, scientists say.
The tool was tested using historical information from Chicago. The model also performed well with data from seven other US cities: Atlanta, Austin, Detroit, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Portland, and San Francisco.
Recall that in August 2021, the Pentagon tested a decision-making system capable of foreseeing events several days in advance.
In September, DeepMind developed a rain prediction algorithm.
Subscribe to Cryplogger AI at TikTok!
Found a mistake in the text? Select it and press CTRL+ENTER
