This week Google and the CIA announced a joint venture with an internet company named "Recorded Future". a company that claims it could foresee the future based on analyzing current data - "Minority Report" anyone?...
Having seen the potential of analyzing the ridiculous amounts of data floating out on the web, I do not think the claim brought forth by Christopher Ahlberg, Recorded Future's CEO, is that far fetched. If you can create a database large enough and an engine strong enough and smart enough to correlate the who, what, where and when of everything that is currently happening on the web, you could, to a certain degree, deduct what is happening next.
Smaller version of this technology is already out there in the form of Google Trends and similar data sharing initiatives for the purpose of composing a criminal's possible path are already in place in many counties around the country. It was just a matter of time before someone out there would take it to the next level.
Anyone who watched "Minority Report" or is worried about freedom of speech and privacy would have to ask these questions: What happens when we act on a forecast that was completely wrong? How do you indict someone for a crime they have not yet committed? Are we, in a sense, giving up our freedoms on the web? At what point would this technology be taken over by marketing companies?
All the legalities are yet to be addressed but the technology itself is interesting and would put to the test the concept of artificial intelligence. Can a computer, with enough data fed to it, come up with a plausible guess of the future? And how scared would I be if it was spot on?
Comments
"How do you indict someone for a crime they have not yet committed?" That's a pretty far leap from predicting things to pridicting crime and then punishing for it. And the news you stated prior to this comment doesn't even lend its self to this kind of wild leap.
"All the legalities are yet to be addressed "
There is no legality at issue here.
I do not think it is a big leap from predicting anything to predicting crime. The process is the same, you gather information and make a guess about what is coming next. Remember that law enforcement is currently using the internet as a crime solving tool so moving one step further to crime prevention is a desirable tool but the technology is not there yet. Predicting what a your future holds may include predicting a crime you might commit. I do not think the system is going to be used as a crime prevention tool but it will definitely be used as a counter terrorism tool which is, to some level, a type of a crime.
I do believe there are many legalities to address starting with the right for privacy and how the information was shared or obtained.
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