Footage captured by a food delivery robot in Los Angeles was used to arrest and convict two men after a failed attempt to steal it off the street earlier this year, 404 Media reports.
Serve Robotics, which works with Uber Eats for last-mile deliveries in the area, shared videos of the incident with the Los Angeles Police Department both proactively and following subpoena. Emails obtained by 404 show that Serve met with the LAPD to “open a line of communication” before any potential problems occurred.
This news comes at a time when public awareness of the technology is already high, with concerns about how much robots record and where that footage ultimately goes. Ali Kashani, CEO of Serve Robotics, shared a tweet on social media where he boasted about the resulting convictions: “A genius once tried to steal one of our robots… It didn’t end well (for them).” In a follow-up blog post, Kashani takes a softer stance, trying to explain how the company balances its approach to involving law enforcement with its approach to public accountability and increasing trust.
The company’s policies, Kashani said, include “not using robots for surveillance or other purposes that violate the public’s sense of privacy” and “not placing unnecessary pressure on public resources by calling the police to intervene in every minor incident of robot vandalism.” In this incident, which was immediately reported to the police and arrests were made, the robot managed to escape from the thieves on its own and, in Kashani’s words, was not harmed. The company handed over all relevant footage to the police before deleting it.
It remains unclear how long Serve normally keeps recordings of its robots, and its vague explanations about the potential use of the videos do not inspire confidence. Serve’s head of communications, Aduke Thelwell, told 404 Media that it is the company’s policy to “regularly delete camera feed unless otherwise required and comply with subpoena requests.”
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