Democracy Dies in Darkness

A school locked down after AI flagged a gun. It was a clarinet.

A growing number of schools across the country use AI-powered surveillance to detect guns and contraband, all in the name of making schools safer.

A false alarm was raised at a Seminole County middle school in Florida after an AI surveillance system flagged a clarinet as a gun. (Paul Hennessy/Associated Press)

Police responded to the Florida middle school minutes after the alert arrived last week: Security cameras had detected a man in the building, dressed in camouflage with a “suspected weapon pointed down the hallway, being held in the position of a shouldered rifle.”

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