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How AI surveillance threatens democracy everywhere

The spread of AI-powered surveillance systems has empowered governments seeking greater control with tools that entrench non-democracy.

Around the same time, Malaysia partnered with China’s Yitu Technology to provide police with an AI-powered facial recognition system linked to a central database for real-time identification of citizens from body camera footage. According to the 2019 AI Global Surveillance Index, 56 out of 176 countries now use artificial intelligence in some capacity to keep cities “safe.” Among other things, frail non-democratic governments can use AI-enabled monitoring to detect and track individuals and deter civil disobedience before it begins, thereby bolstering their authority. Democracies should establish ethical frameworks, mandate transparency, limit how mass surveillance data is used, enshrine privacy protections, and impose clear redlines on government use of AI for social control.

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