Axon, a company that develops Taser guns, body cameras and other law enforcement technologies, is suspending a project to develop Taser drones, which are believed to be used to combat mass shooting.
This effort was suspended after strong opposition to the idea, including the resignation of nine members of the Axion Ethics Advisory Committee.
Ricksmith, the founder and CEO of axon, first put forward the concept of early stage in a blog post last Thursday. He said that better solutions are needed to protect schools, teachers and students, “including those using technology.” more than a week ago, a gunman killed 21 people in a primary school in uwald, Texas.
Smith said that non lethal UAVs can be installed in schools and other places, and “play the same role as sprinklers and other fire-fighting tools for firefighters: prevent catastrophic events, or at least mitigate their most serious impact.”
Axon is headquartered in Scottsdale, Arizona, and has important engineering facilities in Seattle. The company said its mission was to help reduce the use of force by the police by providing transparency, technology and tools that could replace deadly weapons.
On Thursday, axon released a statement from the axon AI Ethics Advisory Committee on twitter (see below), in which the committee said that the idea of the UAV first attracted its attention more than a year ago. Last month, most members of the committee voted against moving forward. The board of directors said that axon’s decision to continue development “made us pause for quite a long time”, and publicly announced that this decision was “deeply regretted”
On Sunday, Smith wrote in a new blog post that the company hopes to find a solution to the mass shootings in the United States, which prompted the company to act quickly and share its ideas.
“This has indeed triggered quite a lot of public discussion, enabling us to have a deeper understanding of the complex and important considerations related to this issue,” he wrote.
Smith added: “unfortunately, some members of the Axion ethics advisory group opted out of direct involvement in these issues before we heard or had the opportunity to resolve their technical issues.”.
The nine members who resigned issued a public statement on Monday, saying that they did not expect the company’s announcement on Thursday. The use of school UAVs is not a potential pilot study they have been considering.
“We all feel the urgent need to take measures to address the epidemic of mass shooting incidents,” the members said. “But axon’s proposal to improve technical and police response in the presence of much less dangerous alternatives is not the solution.”