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Lessons from ‘stop and frisk’ can help Philly police use drones to improve safety without compromising civil liberties

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theconversation.com – Robert Kane, Professor of Criminology and Justice Studies, Drexel University – 2025-01-21 07:36:00

Aerial view of South Philadelphia neighborhood.
halbergman/E+ Collection via Getty Images

Robert Kane, Drexel University and Jordan Hyatt, Drexel University

Philadelphia’s plans to expand its use of police-operated drones signals a pivotal shift in how the city seeks to protect – and surveil – its citizens.

According to the city’s Citizen Police Oversight Commission, the Philadelphia Police Department had two drones as of early 2024. These were, the commission says, primarily used by SWAT teams to scout locations before serving high-risk warrants.

The 2025 city budget earmarks over US$800,000 for police drones, a spokesperson from the department’s Office of Public Affairs told us via email in response to our questions.

The spokesperson also confirmed that Philadelphia police are conducting test flights in Kensington and the surrounding area as part of the initial phase of a “Drone First Responder” program. For now, they say, they’re simply gathering data on how quickly drones respond to certain types of 911 calls compared with traditional police responses.

Police technology can evolve rapidly, and many police agencies across the country already use drones – including as first responders.

This technology may make the operation of law enforcement agencies more efficient and perhaps safer for officers, as they can have eyes on a scene from a safe distance. But many privacy advocates and members of the public have raised concerns about the privacy implications.

We are Philadelphia-based criminologists and researchers who seek to understand the impact of policing practices and technologies, including body-worn cameras and Tasers, on police legitimacy and public policy.

We see how drone policing can pose an almost entirely new set of potential benefits – and risks.

Drone pictured flying in air near top of nearby building with blue sky in background
A police drone flies near Bourbon Street in New Orleans on Jan. 2, 2025, after the driver of a pickup truck plowed into a New Year’s crowd overnight, killing at least 14 people.
Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP via Getty Images)

Benefits for police

Drones are already used for many commercial and recreational purposes.

In Pennsylvania, police drones have recently been used in traffic management and searches for fugitives.

These devices can be equipped with facial recognition, AI, gunfire detection and other new tech that has the potential to transform the scope and nature of the data that police can collect.

Drones can provide rapid emergency responses, such as locating missing persons in remote areas or delivering medical supplies to accident victims in hard-to-reach locations.

During critical situations, they can offer live intelligence by transmitting real-time aerial footage of active crime scenes, such as armed standoffs or large-scale public disturbances. This allows officers to effectively strategize without immediate exposure to danger.

Additionally, drones can reduce the risk of officer injuries during dangerous live pursuits by tracking fleeing suspects from the air, minimizing the need for high-speed vehicle chases or foot pursuits through hazardous environments.

Privacy concerns

Given their small size, aerial maneuverability and, in many cases, ability to record audio and video, drones present new and specific challenges to Fourth Amendment protections, particularly against unreasonable searches and seizures.

In the 1967 Katz v. United States case, the Supreme Court decided people are protected from being recorded by the police in places where they may reasonably expect privacy.

While that case was about a closed phone booth, the logic has been expanded over the years to protect people from new technological intrusion, such as thermal vision.

However, police do not need a warrant to observe and record activities that are visible to the public. In the 1988 case Florida v. Riley, for example, the court decided that police were permissibly able to look into someone’s yard from a helicopter hovering at 400 feet.

While drones are capable of flying much higher than 400 feet, they can also linger 40 feet, or even 4 feet, from a yard, building or window. And they do so in almost complete silence.

Though the Supreme Court has yet to decide whether it is reasonable for people to assume they are protected from drone-based imaging, the highest state court in Michigan recently allowed police to use warrantless drone-recorded footage to count the number of cars on a fenced property in pursuit of a civil zoning violation.

While each state is still able to set its own rules, privacy advocates are concerned that drone surveillance could be used to collect evidence without judicial oversight, or to surveil people without legal limitations or consequences for the violation of constitutional privacy rights.

Low-income communities and communities of color often bear the brunt of overpolicing and surveillance, and drone usage in these neighborhoods could exacerbate existing inequities by increasing scrutiny, perpetuating bias and reinforcing systemic distrust of policing.

Philadelphia’s track record concerning “stop-and-frisk” pedestrian stops sheds important light on those concerns.

A uniformed police officer walks down a sidewalk with about a dozen people around him
Philadelphia Police Commissioner Kevin Bethel has referred to drones as the future of policing in the city, according to local news outlets WHYY and The Philadelphia Inquirer.
Spencer Platt/Getty Images

Lessons from stop and frisk

The landmark stop-and-frisk case Bailey v. City of Philadelphia led to a federal consent decree over the Philadelphia Police Department’s stop-and-frisk practices.

This decree was called the “Bailey agreement.” It required the Philadelphia police to document all stop-and-frisk encounters, revise their policies and training to comply with constitutional standards, and reduce stops that lacked reasonable suspicion or were influenced by racial bias.

The agreement also established independent monitoring and public reporting to ensure transparency and accountability. Data analyses were regularly submitted to a federal judge for oversight.

The lessons from Bailey can inform how the Philadelphia Police Department might approach its drone program to avoid overreach. Misuse of these drones can directly affect the perceived legitimacy of police, already a fraught issue in some communities.

Here are several ways Philadelphia could avoid the pitfalls of unchecked surveillance when it comes to police drones.

1. Real-time monitoring

Real-time monitoring by an independent oversight body of drone deployments, along with clear documentation of each mission, would enable regular oversight like the structured checks in Bailey.

2. Transparency

Public reporting could help ensure community members understand the purposes and limitations of drone usage in their neighborhoods. An independent oversight body or a citizen review board could issue regular reports summarizing deployment data, such as the number of drone flights, their general locations and purposes, and the outcomes of those operations, along with details on data management and compliance with privacy safeguards.

Transparency around how data collected by police drones will be managed is essential for maintaining public trust. Data retention and deletion policies could reassure residents that drone data isn’t being stockpiled indefinitely but rather used only for its intended purpose.

3. Limited usage

Protocols can limit the scope of drone surveillance to specific, critical-use cases – such as emergencies or search-and-rescue operations – and avoid use for regular monitoring of public spaces. A narrowly defined scope would clarify that drones serve as targeted, situational tools rather than blanket surveillance devices.

4. Ethics training and education

Ethics training could be part of drone operator preparation to help pilots manage the gray areas of surveillance and ensure that deployments respect constitutional rights.

To further the culture of police accountability, drone operators and officers alike should understand that surveillance tools – whether stop-and-frisk or drones – have far-reaching implications for community relationships and the broader perception of justice.

5. Demonstrate effectiveness

Bailey’s monitoring process relied on metrics to evaluate stop-and-frisk practices, uncover patterns of misuse and guide reforms. Similarly, police might track the extent to which drones improve response times, reduce crime or enhance public safety in meaningful ways.

Such evaluations would require transparency in reporting results – and not just the successes but also the failures and unintended consequences. Without evidence-based assessments, public skepticism could prevail and undermine the technology’s legitimacy.

With clear guidelines, community involvement and legal accountability, we believe drones can enhance safety without compromising civil liberties, and foster rather than erode public trust.The Conversation

Robert Kane, Professor of Criminology and Justice Studies, Drexel University and Jordan Hyatt, Associate Professor of Criminology and Justice Studies, Drexel University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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Legal fight against AI-generated child pornography is complicated – a legal scholar explains why, and how the law could catch up

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theconversation.com – Wayne Unger, Assistant Professor of Law, Quinnipiac University – 2025-02-11 07:46:00

Legal fight against AI-generated child pornography is complicated – a legal scholar explains why, and how the law could catch up

Child pornography laws may be clear, but AI makes enforcement more difficult.
AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite

Wayne Unger, Quinnipiac University

The city of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, was shaken by revelations in December 2023 that two local teenage boys shared hundreds of nude images of girls in their community over a private chat on the social chat platform Discord. Witnesses said the photos easily could have been mistaken for real ones, but they were fake. The boys had used an artificial intelligence tool to superimpose real photos of girls’ faces onto sexually explicit images.

With troves of real photos available on social media platforms, and AI tools becoming more accessible across the web, similar incidents have played out across the country, from California to Texas and Wisconsin. A recent survey by the Center for Democracy and Technology, a Washington D.C.-based nonprofit, found that 15% of students and 11% of teachers knew of at least one deepfake that depicted someone associated with their school in a sexually explicit or intimate manner.

The Supreme Court has implicitly concluded that computer-generated pornographic images that are based on images of real children are illegal. The use of generative AI technologies to make deepfake pornographic images of minors almost certainly falls under the scope of that ruling. As a legal scholar who studies the intersection of constitutional law and emerging technologies, I see an emerging challenge to the status quo: AI-generated images that are fully fake but indistinguishable from real photos.

Policing child sexual abuse material

While the internet’s architecture has always made it difficult to control what is shared online, there are a few kinds of content that most regulatory authorities across the globe agree should be censored. Child pornography is at the top of that list.

For decades, law enforcement agencies have worked with major tech companies to identify and remove this kind of material from the web, and to prosecute those who create or circulate it. But the advent of generative artificial intelligence and easy-to-access tools like the ones used in the Pennsylvania case present a vexing new challenge for such efforts.

In the legal field, child pornography is generally referred to as child sexual abuse material, or CSAM, because the term better reflects the abuse that is depicted in the images and videos and the resulting trauma to the children involved. In 1982, the Supreme Court ruled that child pornography is not protected under the First Amendment because safeguarding the physical and psychological well-being of a minor is a compelling government interest that justifies laws that prohibit child sexual abuse material.

That case, New York v. Ferber, effectively allowed the federal government and all 50 states to criminalize traditional child sexual abuse material. But a subsequent case, Ashcroft v. Free Speech Coalition from 2002, might complicate efforts to criminalize AI-generated child sexual abuse material. In that case, the court struck down a law that prohibited computer-generated child pornography, effectively rendering it legal.

The government’s interest in protecting the physical and psychological well-being of children, the court found, was not implicated when such obscene material is computer generated. “Virtual child pornography is not ‘intrinsically related’ to the sexual abuse of children,” the court wrote.

States move to criminalize AI-generated CSAM

According to the child advocacy organization Enough Abuse, 37 states have criminalized AI-generated or AI-modified CSAM, either by amending existing child sexual abuse material laws or enacting new ones. More than half of those 37 states enacted new laws or amended their existing ones within the past year.

California, for example, enacted Assembly Bill 1831 on Sept. 29, 2024, which amended its penal code to prohibit the creation, sale, possession and distribution of any “digitally altered or artificial-intelligence-generated matter” that depicts a person under 18 engaging in or simulating sexual conduct.

YouTube video
Deepfake child pornography is a growing problem.

While some of these state laws target the use of photos of real people to generate these deep fakes, others go further, defining child sexual abuse material as “any image of a person who appears to be a minor under 18 involved in sexual activity,” according to Enough Abuse. Laws like these that encompass images produced without depictions of real minors might run counter to the Supreme Court’s Ashcroft v. Free Speech Coalition ruling.

Real vs. fake, and telling the difference

Perhaps the most important part of the Ashcroft decision for emerging issues around AI-generated child sexual abuse material was part of the statute that the Supreme Court did not strike down. That provision of the law prohibited “more common and lower tech means of creating virtual (child sexual abuse material), known as computer morphing,” which involves taking pictures of real minors and morphing them into sexually explicit depictions.

The court’s decision stated that these digitally altered sexually explicit depictions of minors “implicate the interests of real children and are in that sense closer to the images in Ferber.” The decision referenced the 1982 case, New York v. Ferber, in which the Supreme Court upheld a New York criminal statute that prohibited persons from knowingly promoting sexual performances by children under the age of 16.

The court’s decisions in Ferber and Ashcroft could be used to argue that any AI-generated sexually explicit image of real minors should not be protected as free speech given the psychological harms inflicted on the real minors. But that argument has yet to be made before the court. The court’s ruling in Ashcroft may permit AI-generated sexually explicit images of fake minors.

But Justice Clarence Thomas, who concurred in Ashcroft, cautioned that “if technological advances thwart prosecution of ‘unlawful speech,’ the Government may well have a compelling interest in barring or otherwise regulating some narrow category of ‘lawful speech’ in order to enforce effectively laws against pornography made through the abuse of real children.”

With the recent significant advances in AI, it can be difficult if not impossible for law enforcement officials to distinguish between images of real and fake children. It’s possible that we’ve reached the point where computer-generated child sexual abuse material will need to be banned so that federal and state governments can effectively enforce laws aimed at protecting real children – the point that Thomas warned about over 20 years ago.

If so, easy access to generative AI tools is likely to force the courts to grapple with the issue.The Conversation

Wayne Unger, Assistant Professor of Law, Quinnipiac University

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Rural Americans don’t live as long as those in cities − new research

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theconversation.com – Elizabeth Currid-Halkett, James Irvine Chair in Urban and Regional Planning and Professor of Public Policy, University of Southern California – 2025-02-11 07:45:00

Rural Americans don’t live as long as those in cities − new research

Part of the problem is that people living in rural areas don’t always have easy access to health care.
cstar55/iStock via Getty Images

Elizabeth Currid-Halkett, University of Southern California; Bryan Tysinger, University of Southern California, and Jack Chapel, University of Southern California

Rural Americans – particularly men – are expected to live significantly shorter, less healthy lives than their urban counterparts, according to our research, recently published in the Journal of Rural Health.

We found that a 60-year-old man living in a rural area is expected on average to live two fewer years than an urban man. For women, the rural-urban gap is six months.

A key reason is worse rates among rural people for smoking, obesity and chronic conditions such as high blood pressure and heart disease. These conditions are condemning millions to disability and shortened lives.

What’s more, these same people live in areas where medical care is evaporating. Living in rural areas, with their relatively sparse populations, often means a shortage of doctors, longer travel distances for medical care and inadequate investments in public health, driven partly by declines in economic opportunities.

Our team arrived at these findings by using a simulation called the Future Elderly Model. With that, we were able to simulate the future life course of Americans currently age 60 living in either an urban or rural area.

The model is based on relationships observed in 20 years of data from the Health and Retirement Study, an ongoing survey that follows people from age 51 through the rest of their lives. Specifically, the model showed how long these Americans might live, the expected quality of their future years, and how certain changes in lifestyle would affect the results.

We describe the conditions that drive our results as “diseases of despair,” building off the landmark work of pioneering researchers who coined the now widely used term “deaths of despair.” They documented rising mortality among Americans without a college degree and related these deaths to declines in social and economic prospects.

The main causes of deaths of despair – drug overdoses, liver disease and suicide – have also been called “diseases of despair.” But the conditions we study, such as heart disease, could similarly be influenced by social and economic prospects. And they can profoundly reduce quality of life.

We also found that if rural education levels were as high as in urban areas, this would eliminate almost half of the rural-urban life-expectancy gap. Our data shows 65% of urban 60-year-olds were educated beyond high school, compared with 53% of rural residents the same age.

One possible reason for the difference is that getting a bachelor’s degree may make a person more able or willing to follow scientific recommendations – and more likely to work out for 150 minutes a week or eat their veggies as their doctor advises them to.

YouTube video
Rural communities are increasingly hampered by their lack of access to health care.

Why it matters

The gap between urban and rural health outcomes has widened over recent decades. Yet the problem goes beyond disparities between urban and rural health: It also splits down some of the party lines and social divides that separate U.S. citizens, such as education and lifestyle.

Scholarship on the decline of rural America suggests that people living outside larger cities are resentful of the economic forces that may have eroded their economic power. The interplay between these forces and the health conditions we study are less appreciated.

Economic circumstances can contribute to health outcomes. For example, increased stress and sedentary lifestyle due to joblessness can contribute to chronic health issues such as cardiovascular disease. Declines in economic prospects due to automation and trade liberalization are linked to increases in mortality.

But health can also have a strong influence on economic outcomes. Hospitalizations cause high medical costs, loss of work and earnings, and increases in bankruptcy. The onset of chronic disease and disability can lead to long-lasting declines in income. Even health events experienced early in childhood can have economic consequences decades later.

In tandem, these health and economic trends might reinforce each other and help fuel inequality between rural and urban areas that produces a profoundly different quality of life.

What still isn’t known

It should be noted that our results, like many studies, are describing outcomes on average; the rural population is not a monolith. In fact, some of the most physically active and healthy people we know live in rural areas.

Just how much your location affects your health is an ongoing area of research. But as researchers begin to understand more, we can come up with strategies to promote health among all Americans, regardless of where they live.

The Research Brief is a short take on interesting academic work.The Conversation

Elizabeth Currid-Halkett, James Irvine Chair in Urban and Regional Planning and Professor of Public Policy, University of Southern California; Bryan Tysinger, Assistant Professor of Health Policy and Management, University of Southern California, and Jack Chapel, Postdoctoral Scholar in Economics, University of Southern California

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If FEMA didn’t exist, could states handle the disaster response alone?

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theconversation.com – Ming Xie, Assistant Professor of Emergency Management and Public Health, University of Maryland, Baltimore County – 2025-02-10 07:45:00

If FEMA didn’t exist, could states handle the disaster response alone?

Hurricane Ian caused widespread damage in Florida in 2022, estimated at over $112 billion. This scene was once a shopping center.
Giorgio Veira/AFP via Getty Images

Ming Xie, University of Maryland, Baltimore County

Imagine a world in which a hurricane devastates the Gulf Coast, and the U.S. has no federal agency prepared to quickly send supplies, financial aid and temporary housing assistance.

Could the states manage this catastrophic event on their own?

Normally, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, known as FEMA, is prepared to marshal supplies within hours of a disaster and begin distributing financial aid to residents who need help.

However, with President Donald Trump questioning FEMA’s future and suggesting states take over recovery instead, and climate change causing more frequent and severe disasters, it’s worth asking how prepared states are to face these growing challenges without help.

What FEMA does

FEMA was created in 1979 with the job of coordinating national responses to disasters, but the federal government has played important roles in disaster relief since the 1800s.

During a disaster, FEMA’s assistance can begin only after a state requests an emergency declaration and the U.S. president approves it. The request has to show that the disaster is so severe that the state can’t handle the response on its own.

FEMA’s role is to support state and local governments by coordinating federal agencies and providing financial aid and recovery assistance that states would otherwise struggle to supply on their own. FEMA doesn’t “take over,” as a misinformation campaign launched during Hurricane Helene claimed. Instead, it pools federal resources to allow states to recover faster from expensive disasters.

During a disaster, FEMA:

  • Coordinates federal resources. For example, during Hurricane Ian in 2022, FEMA coordinated with the U.S. Coast Guard, the Department of Defense and search-and-rescue teams to conduct rescue operations, organized utility crews to begin restoring power and also delivered water and millions of meals.

  • Provides financial assistance. FEMA distributes billions of dollars in disaster relief funds to help individuals, businesses and local governments recover. As of Feb. 3, 2025, FEMA aid from 2024 storms included US$1.04 billion related to Hurricane Milton, $416.1 million for Hurricane Helene and $112.6 million for Hurricane Debby.

  • Provides logistical support. FEMA coordinates with state and local governments, nonprofits such as the American Red Cross and federal agencies to supply cots, blankets and hygiene supplies for emergency shelters. It also works with state and local partners to distribute critical supplies such as food, water and medical aid.

The agency also manages the National Flood Insurance Program, offers disaster preparedness training and helps states develop response plans to improve their overall responses systems.

What FEMA aid looks like in a disaster

When wildfires swept through Maui, Hawaii, in August 2023, FEMA provided emergency grants to cover immediate needs such as food, clothing and essential supplies for survivors.

The agency arranged hotel rooms, rental assistance and financial aid for residents who lost homes or belongings. Its Direct Housing Program has spent $295 million to lease homes for more than 1,200 households. This comprehensive support helped thousands of people begin rebuilding their lives after losing almost everything.

FEMA also helped fund construction of a temporary school to ensure that students whose schools burned could continue their classes. Hawaii, with its relatively small population and limited emergency funds, would have struggled to mount a comparable response on its own.

A man wearing a T-shirt with the state seal of Hawaii speaks with reporters, standing next to a woman with 'FEMA' on her cap and shirt with ocean and burned properties behind them.
Hawaii Gov. Josh Green, center, and then-FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell speak to reporters in Lahaina, Hawaii, on Aug. 12, 2023, while assessing the wildfire damage there.
AP Photo/Rick Bowmer

Larger states often need help, too. When a 2021 winter storm overwhelmed Texas’ power grid and water infrastructure, FEMA coordinated the delivery of essential supplies, including water, fuel, generators and blankets, following the disaster declaration on Feb. 19, 2021. Within days, it awarded more than $2.8 million in grants to help people with temporary housing and home repairs.

Which states would suffer most without FEMA?

Without FEMA or other federal support, states would have to manage the disaster response and recovery on their own.

States prone to frequent disasters, such as Louisiana and Florida, would face expensive recurring challenges that would likely exacerbate recovery delays and reduce their overall resilience.

Smaller, more rural and less wealthy states that lack the financial resources and logistical capabilities to respond effectively would be disproportionately affected.

“States don’t have that capability built to handle a disaster every single year,” Lynn Budd, director of the Wyoming Office of Homeland Security, told Stateline in an interview. Access to FEMA avoids the need for expensive disaster response infrastructure in each state.

States might be able to arrange regional cooperation. But state-led responses and regional models have limitations. The National Guard could assist with supply distribution, but it isn’t designed to provide fast financial aid, housing or long-term recovery options, and the supplies and the recovery effort still come at a cost.

A National Guard member walks in front of search and rescue vehicles.
Members of the National Guard and a FEMA search-and-rescue team work together in the disaster response after Hurricane Florence pounded Wilmington, N.C., in September 2018.
Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP via Getty Images

Wealthier states might be better equipped to manage on their own, but poorer states would likely struggle. States with less funding and infrastructure would be left relying on nonprofits and community-based efforts. But these organizations are not capable of providing the scope of services FEMA can.

Any federal funding would also be slow if Congress had to approve aid after each disaster, rather than having FEMA already prepared to respond. States would be at the mercy of congressional infighting.

In the absence of a federal response and coordinating role, recovery would be uneven, with wealthier areas recovering faster and poorer areas likely seeing more prolonged hardships.

What does this mean?

Coordinating disaster response is complex, the paperwork for federal assistance can be frustrating, and the agency does draw criticism. However, it also fills an important role.

As the frequency of natural disasters continues to rise due to climate change, ask yourself: How prepared is your state for a disaster, and could it get by without federal aid?The Conversation

Ming Xie, Assistant Professor of Emergency Management and Public Health, University of Maryland, Baltimore County

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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