AI mistakes a bag of Doritos for a gun, calls the cops

'AI Gun Detection' detection technology deployed at a US high school mistook a student eating a bag of Doritos for someone holding a gun.

AI mistakes a bag of Doritos for a gun, calls the cops
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TL;DR: An AI gun detection system at a Baltimore County school mistakenly identified a student holding a bag of Doritos as carrying a firearm, leading to his handcuffing and police intervention. The incident raises concerns about AI accuracy and the potential consequences of false weapon alerts in school security systems.

According to a local news report from WBAL-TV 11 News, an "artificial intelligence detector" called the cops on a student at a Baltimore County school for mistaking a bag of Doritos for a gun. Apparently, the student was outside his high school, eating some Doritos and chatting to friends when the Omnilert AI system notified the police that a gun-carrying individual was on school property.

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'Omnilert: AI Gun Detection & Emergency Response Technology' is a security and proactive system that automatically notifies law enforcement and emergency services when it detects firearms within a "fraction of a second." According to Omnilert's official website, there's a human verification step with one of its certified operators before a call is placed to the police, so it's unclear how a bag of chips could have been mistaken for a gun.

The student in question, Taki Allen, told reporters that "eight cop cars" pulled up with officers pointing their guns at him, asking him to get on the ground, on the suspicion that he was carrying a firearm. "They made me get on my knees, put my hands behind my back, and cuffed me," Allen said. "Then, they searched me and they figured out I had nothing."

According to the report, it does sound like the image of Taki Allen holding a bag of Doritos could have looked like it was a gun, as apparently the cops showed him the picture where "it was two hands and one finger out, and they said it looked like a gun." The image in question hasn't been released to the public, so we can only assume what it might look like when a bag of Doritos is mistaken for a gun. Or the steps students need to take when eating a bag of chips to avoid being mistaken for an active shooter.