AI technology is evolving fast. China’s love for artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning has now resulted in a smart prosecutor bot that can press charges on criminal behavior with up to 97% accuracy.
The AI prosecutor was developed by a team from the Chinese Academy of Sciences’ big data and knowledge management lab headed by Professor Shi Yong – who claims that the machine can determine a crime and file a charge solely based on a verbal description of what happened.
The AI program currently runs on a desktop computer, and was developed to its current state after the team trained it between 2015 and 2020 using over 17,000 different #criminal cases.
Currently, the bot can charge suspects using 1,000 different “traits” derived from human-described case documentations, and can be used to charge some of Shanghai’s most common felonies – including fraud, credit card fraud, theft, intentional harm, dangerous driving, obstructions of justice, running illegal gambling operations, and provoking trouble.
While this sounds pretty revolutionary overall, it isn’t the first time #China has used AI in its justice system. In 2016, #Chinese legislators were introduced to System 206 – an AI tool that is able to evaluate evidence and arrest conditions, as well as determine just how dangerous a suspect could be to the general public.
The new AI prosecutor currently works in tandem with System 206, and fills in the gaps left by the older program, namely filing charges and suggesting what sentences to mete out for individual crimes.
If all goes according to plan, the new AI prosecutor should be able to help the justice system by reducing the workloads of human prosecutors and allow them to devote more time to dealing with more difficult and tricky cases.
While it has its fair share of limitations (considering just how new it is), the development team behind the program says that it’ll only improve with time and progressive upgrades.
For instance, future improvements may allow it to pinpoint more obscure felonies, or even file multiple charges against a single suspect based on the details of the case on file.
