Global InformationGeolitica information
| Company type | Private |
|---|---|
| Founded | 1 January 2012  |
| Founders |
|
| Headquarters | Santa Cruz, California, U.S. |
Key people | Brian MacDonald (CEO)[2] |
| Products | Predictive analytics |
| Website | www |
PredPol, Inc, now known as Geolitica,[2] is a predictive policing company that attempts to predict property crimes using predictive analytics. PredPol is also the name of the software the company produces. PredPol began as a project of the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) and University of California, Los Angeles professor Jeff Brantingham. PredPol has produced a patented algorithm, which is based on a model used to predict earthquake aftershocks.
As of 2020, PredPol's algorithm is the most commonly used predictive policing algorithm in the U.S.[3][4] Police departments that use PredPol are given printouts of jurisdiction maps that denote areas where crime has been predicted to occur throughout the day.[5] The Los Angeles Times reported that officers are expected to patrol these areas during their shifts, as the system tracks their movements via the GPS in their patrol cars.[6] Scholar Ruha Benjamin called PredPol a "crime production algorithm," as police officers then more heavily patrol these predicted crime zones, expecting to see crime, which leads to a self-fulfilling prophecy.[3]
In an August 2023 earnings call, the CEO of SoundThinking announced that the company had begun the process of absorbing parts of Geolitica, including its engineering team, patents, and customers. According to SoundThinking, Geolitica would cease operations at the end of 2023.[7]
- ^ Gilbertson, Annie (August 20, 2020). "Data-informed predictive policing was heralded as less biased. Is it?". Mic.
- ^ a b Cite error: The named reference
Gizwas invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ a b Benjamin, Ruha (2019). Race After Technology: Abolitionist Tools for the New Jim Code. Medford, MA: Polity. p. 83.
- ^ Heaven, Will Douglas (July 17, 2020). "Predictive policing algorithms are racist. They need to be dismantled". MIT Technology Review.
- ^ Wang, Jackie (2018). Carceral Capitalism. South Pasadena, CA: Semiotext(e). p. 241.
- ^ Puente, Mark (July 3, 2019). "LAPD pioneered predicting crime with data. Many police don't think it works". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved November 22, 2020.
- ^ Mehrotra, Dhruv (September 27, 2023). "The Maker of ShotSpotter Is Buying the World's Most Infamous Predictive Policing Tech". Wired. ISSN 1059-1028. Retrieved September 27, 2023.