A deadly shooting in San Francisco over the weekend may have been recorded by a nearby robotaxi — a possibility that suggests America’s new autonomous vehicle cadre may soon be key to law enforcement investigations.
One person was killed and another was seriously injured in a shooting in the city’s Mission neighborhood. The San Francisco Standard cites calls to 9-1-1 dispatchers stating that a Waymo was parked nearby and may have recorded the fatal incident. It is not clear whether police have since sought data on that vehicle from the company. Gizmodo contacted Waymo and the San Francisco Police Department for more information.
Police revealed Sunday that the suspect in the shooting has been identified as 23-year-old Larry Hudson Jr. Hudson was located in a nearby neighborhood of the city, he was arrested without incident and booked into the county jail.
The Waymos are covered in tiny cameras and are thus fully equipped to survey their surroundings (according to a recent count, they have at least 29 different cameras on their interior and exterior). Privacy advocates have previously complained about the cars, noting their ability to act as little mobile slobs. However, the company has previously said that it is not in the habit of feeding data to law enforcement unless given a proper request.
During a recent interview with the New York Times tech podcast Hard Fork, Waymo co-CEO Takedra Mwakana said the company has been transparent about its privacy policy. “On the question of when and how law enforcement gets access to our data, we explain that publicly,” Mwakana told podcasters. “We follow the legal process to obtain footage from our vehicles, and we limit its scope as necessary.” A representative for Waymo previously told Business Insider that the company will challenge data requests that are deemed not to have a proper legal basis. “Our policy is to challenge, limit or deny requests that do not have a valid legal basis or are overbroad,” the representative said.
Autonomous vehicles are the latest proof that smart devices are part of the surveillance economy. In general, any time police can use a tool to secure digital evidence of a crime, they will do so. In 2018, Amazon was ordered to hand over data from an Echo device as potential evidence in a murder that occurred in New Hampshire the previous year. In 2021, Tesla’s cameras helped lead to arrests in a series of hate crimes. More recently, footage of the Uber Eats delivery bot was used in a criminal case involving its own attempted kidnapping. With driverless cars jamming the streets of more and more American cities, it seems inevitable that self-driving cars will be next.