Taser Drone Grounded After Company's Ethics Board Resigns
Axon is hitting pause on its plan to use taser-equipped drones to stop school shootings after a majority of its AI ethics board resigned in protest.
On Monday, nine of the 14 members resigned, claiming the company ignored consulting Axon’s AI ethics board about the taser-equipped drones.
“The Taser-equipped drone also has no realistic chance of solving the mass shooting problem Axon now is prescribing it for, only distracting society from real solutions to a tragic problem,” the resigning board members wrote(Opens in a new window) in a public resignation letter.
The resignations arrive days after Axon, a provider of body cameras and tasers, introduced the drone as a potential solution to America’s mass shooting problem. The air-based bot is armed with a taser, which can be remotely firmed to incapacitate a live shooter. Although the project is meant to be a concept, the company originally planned on launching a “full solution” by 2024.
However, the proposal immediately faced pushback from critics, including(Opens in a new window) privacy groups, over fears the drones would result in a dystopian robot police force capable of surveilling society. Others were concerned(Opens in a new window) the company is exploiting the mass shooting problem to sell hardware.
Axon’s own AI ethics board also voted against the company’s original proposal for the taser-equipped drones only a few weeks ago. However, board members were blindsided when the company still went ahead and announced the drone to the public last week in the wake of the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, which took the lives of 19 students and two teachers.
“Before Axon’s announcement, we pleaded with the company to pull back. But the company charged ahead in a
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