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Playlist "May Contain Hackers 2022"

Automatically Suspicious - Predictive policing in the Netherlands

Jos Visser LLM Msc

Predictive policing is hip and happening. In the last few years we have seen a number of experiments with predictive policing in The Netherlands. How does that technology work? What were the outcomes of the experiments? And what is the legal status of a suspicion generated by a computer?

"Predictive policing" is the name of a family of technology that use historical crime data to make predictions about future crimes (cue Minority Report). Police departments all over the world are very interested in this technology because it promises better results (more crimes prevented) at lower cost. In the Netherlands we have seen a number of experiments with predictive policing, and one of these systems (CAS) is currently being rolled out throughout the country. But how do these systems work? And how _well_ do they work? And what is actually the legal status of a suspicion generated by a computer?

This talk will give discuss relevant predictive policing experiments in the Netherlands and abroad and will discuss the results of these experiments. The talk will also cover the legal status of suspicions generated by this technology in the Netherlands.