It was revealed that the Massachusetts police bomb squad had been leasing Spot, a dog robot developed by Boston Dynamics, from August to November.
It’s not clear what role Spot was given. However, a state police spokesman said it was attempting the possibility of a robotic dog as a mobile surveillance device, such as looking around a place where dangerous goods were considered installed.
Following the use of the two spots for training purposes, they are said to have been put into two actual cases. It denied whether the autonomous walking robot dog was separately defined in software or equipped with weapons. Boston Dynamics has banned human harm or use for threats under the terms of the robot license. It is also said that the reason why the robot was not sold, but provided for rent, was because the robot was intended for peaceful use.
However, reports also point out that there is a lack of transparency regarding the use of robots by the police. The state police said they did not say whether there were any regulations regarding the use of robots, and they were unable to find anything indicating this in a record disclosure claim against the police agency. For example, with one search warrant technique, you might equip a robot with a weapon and point it at a criminal.
Massachusetts Police Department explains that not all robots, including Spot, are armed. However, in 2016, the Dallas police mounted a bomb on an explosive handling robot and sent it to a perpetrator who killed five people, including the police, and there has been a case of exploding the perpetrator. It was the first case that non-military robots were used for murder, which caused controversy at the time. Related information can be found here .