The Utah Department of Public Safety requested $2 million from state legislators this summer for a surveillance program that uses artificial intelligence to gather social media posts, traffic cameras and other resources. The company Banjo designed the program to be used in real-time emergencies. The Utah Attorney General’s Office used it for training in an AMBER Alert situation. Legislators expressed concern about overreach and privacy violations as they considered results of testing with the state’s Department of Transportation and consider expansion of the technology to other areas of state operations.
