New York City police will send drones to locations of reported robberies and gunshots

Despite civil liberty and accuracy concerns, the NYPD will dispatch drones to gunshots reported by Shotspotter

The New York police department (NYPD) announced it will begin using drones to respond to reports of robberies and alerts from a city-wide gunshot detection system.

The drones will fly to the scene, piloted by an NYPD officer, and record video and audio that will be sent to police officers’ smartphones in real time, according to a press release. The integration of these two surveillance technologies is part of a broader “Drone as First Responder” program that has existed since 2018. New York city mayor Eric Adams and the city’s interim police commissioner Tom Donlan announced the expansion on Wednesday afternoon. It will be initially rolled out to five precincts in Brooklyn, the Bronx and Manhattan. The drones will also be used to collect evidence for investigations, aid in searches for missing people and respond to natural disasters, according to the announcement.