NYPD’s Gunshot Detection System Wastes Time With False Positives, Audit Says

A $45 million detection system expected to help the New York Police Department respond to more incidences of gunfire has “overwhelmingly” sent officers to locations where no shooting could be found or confirmed, the city’s finance chief said. The system, dubbed ShotSpotter, relies on a network of more than 2,000 hidden neighborhood sensors to assist law enforcement in pinpointing the location of suspected gunfire across New York City’s five boroughs. When multiple acoustic sensors pick up a gunshot-like sound, the precise time, location, and short audio snippet will be transmitted to a monitoring center where trained human analysts will determine whether the sound was gunfire or a similar noise—such as fireworks or a car backfiring. Each time a ShotSpotter alert is deemed worth investigating, NYPD officers are dispatched....