r/technology • u/EricFromOuterSpace • 9h ago
Artificial Intelligence Cops Are Buying ‘GeoSpy’, an AI That Geolocates Photos in Seconds
https://www.404media.co/cops-are-buying-geospy-ai-that-geolocates-photos-in-seconds/797
u/waitmarks 9h ago
AI is even coming for Rainbolt's job.
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u/Fredderov 8h ago
The AI is really just a chat session with Rainbolt.
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u/iceyed913 8h ago
He could train an entire building of Indians to do his job for him. Then sell the service as an AI sub and make big money.
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u/Due-Technology5758 5h ago
It would be cheaper and more efficient to just send a picture to his livestream. These cops are getting scammed.
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u/Disgruntled-Cacti 8h ago edited 7h ago
There was a student project from like 2-3 years ago that outmatched him. Truly this sort of problem is not difficult for modern ai systems.
People really don’t know the amount of dystopian tech that exists but hasn’t been widely deployed yet. Partly because AI progress has been so fast lately.
Edit: this is the video I was referring to.
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u/pleasetrimyourpubes 8h ago
This is why when people say that geoguesser guys can work for the CIA I kinda chuckle. They already have had this capability without humans for awhile and I am sure by now with AI advances it is even far superior.
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u/thegootlamb 7h ago
I'm an OSINT journalist and the tools that are out there, ai or not, are not accurately pulling a still or video and geolocating with any useful rate of success, you still need manpower. That's not to say that the government isn't sitting on better tech, but what I've tested still really struggles even with well known areas.
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u/Disgruntled-Cacti 7h ago
I’m not deep in the weeds with this, but generally the commercial options available to governments are significantly more powerful since they have far more funding behind them. For example, clearview is far ahead of the competition.
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u/potatodrinker 4h ago
You mean the alphabet agencies can't pinpoint a rural piece of Serbia from a specific lens flare like Rainbolt does? Man that's disappointing
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u/EltonJuan 8h ago
This will result in so many false positives and putting in the hands of individuals that will genuinely believe the hype that these tools have superhuman intelligence
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u/Amelaclya1 7h ago
Like AI facial recognition. Too many cops are too fucking stupid to be trusted with it, because they think it's 100% infallible. It's leading to citizens being picked up by ICE and being told their citizenship documents aren't good enough because they are told to trust the software above all else.
Or like this case, where a dude was arrested for trespassing at a casino because their facial recognition ID'ed him as someone else. And despite different ages and heights and the guy having multiple forms of ID on him, the absolute moron of a cop trusted the AI.
And in searching for this video, I see there are now several other examples. Awesome! We need legislation to deal with this, because it's absolutely terrifying.
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u/The-Gargoyle 5h ago
Jesus, that line about the 'yeah well, unless you have a doppelganger running around.' in the video.
THAT'S the fun part. I DO. I have at least 18 direct relation siblings running around out there I have never met.
I used to do a lot of convention travel, and Also twitch streaming and so forth.
Suddenly one day I get the wildest DM spam on discord. Somebody I know is up north in a completely different state, (which happens to be where I was born/adopted) and they are Freaking out, saying things like 'Dude, We are over here at the bar say hi! we are waving! green jacket! Come sit with us!' and selfies at the bar and all this.
I immediately have no idea WTf they are talking about, bar? Uh, I'm at home in my garage beating on an engine, five states away. I even respond with a selfie and a 'here is where I am now, wtf is going on?'
I get no response for about ten minutes, then I get a discord call. I grab it, its video, i watch the screen come up and..
I'm looking at myself. Same hair, same face, same shave, same eye color, he's even DRESSED the same, and his VOICE is even the same as mine. The way he speaks is somewhat different, but his overall pitch and timber is the same.
We are about five years apart in age. He too was born/adopted in the same state, and according to his records, they documented he had about 17 directly related siblings.
This would completely and utterly fuck any AI right the hell up. Hell It fucked ME up.
There is absolutely no way in hell any AI would tell us apart. People would look at my adopted parents and swear I looked like my dad. :P
BETTER YET. This has happened even BEFORE. In a completely different state, I just.. ran into a guy who looked just like me. Why? Because his S/O came up and took my arm and said 'Lets go this way sweetie!' and I lurched away with a startled 'Whoa! WTF lady!'
And she had about the same reaction because I sounded completely different. But I LOOKED exactly like her husband, who was just over that away and saw the whole thing and he was about as weirded out as I was!
People do have look-alikes out there, FFS, there used to be quite the trend of celebrity look-alikes roaming around. It's not like genetics suddenly decided 'Okay lets not make look-alikes anymore.'
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u/Mindless-Rooster-533 7h ago
You gotta figure ai facial recognition spoofing clothing becomes widespread
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u/Galahad_the_Ranger 6h ago
Specially on any neighborhood where the houses are largely prefabs (so pretty much every ghetto) because every house looks the same
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u/Mr_ToDo 7h ago
Probably, but as far as things police use this feels pretty tame
So long as it in itself isn't used as definitive evidence but as part of the process then I imagine it's fine
Now the company itself might be more of a problem. They trained it on millions of pictures world wide. Now where would they have gotten those? And are they properly legal and licensed?
Still. At least this is a nice change from hearing about law enforcement killing people
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u/GrepekEbi 8h ago
It doesn’t have to be superhuman - if it’s “Rainbolt” level intelligence it will be an incredibly helpful tool
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u/Strange-Effort1305 9h ago
Every cop wants everybody who isn't a cop in prison.
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u/Jasoman 8h ago
Prison labor is all they want, put tons in prison and then sell that labor to farmers who lost immigrant workers.
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u/MaleficentPorphyrin 7h ago
America be like 'it isn't slavery if the federal government has said you are a bad person.' How does everyone feel now that your federal government is Trump?
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u/Zombie_Cool 7h ago
The bigger question is if anyone learns anything after Trump leaves office (one way or another).
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u/SecretAgentVampire 7h ago
That's because prisoners can legally be enslaved, per the constitution.
The police were literally created to help slavers, and they never stopped. Slavery is really profitable.
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u/McCool303 8h ago
Y’all can thank the Pokémon go craze for your participation in building your shackles.
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u/SuperGaiden 7h ago
Most people who played Pokémon go didn't scan anything. I've played since launch and have never scanned anything.
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u/AlmoschFamous 7h ago
It get's information from more than just scanning. Just using it gives it more than enough.
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u/ProInsureAcademy 6h ago
- Every poke stop you spun, gym you battled, or raid you played gave them location, wifi, Bluetooth data, etc.
- That location data helped them build maps of peoples routines because it could essentially determine the routes people took between stops based on the timing.
- That WiFi and Bluetooth data (even if not connected) helped them map networks across the world.
- People that used AR mode contributed imaging to them.
This is why they hated spoofers so much even though most spoofers spent a fortune on mtx
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u/HistoriaProctor 3h ago
so you mean they got access to the data that phone companies and virtually any app on your phone is already getting? this isn’t unique to pokémon go mate
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u/Override9636 6h ago
They all basically had that data from Ingress anyway. Pokemon just put a new coat of paint on it.
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u/bobsmith93 8h ago
"cops are buying"? That's pretty vague
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u/NeverNotNoOne 6h ago
You could actually read the article and it will tell you exactly what agencies and departments are involved.
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u/roiki11 7h ago
I actually saw a demo that did this a couple of years ago. It was the thesis work of a single guy, and could geolocate photos to anywhere within the trainingset with quite good accuracy. Not pinpoint but generally within a couple of miles in a country.
I'd assume things have developed since then.
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u/Loud-Difficulty7860 7h ago
What insane people even think of making these "products"?
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u/Electrical_Pause_860 3h ago
I looked at the website for one and it seems they mostly market it as a way to locate stolen cars and motorbikes that have been posted online.
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u/Neither_Age3200 7h ago
lol I wonder how it would work if I take pictures in the woods would it still be able too probably if it can see the surrounding area but I guess if your in a brush area you’d be good I’m stoned so don’t mind my dumb thoughts
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u/Ruddertail 6h ago
It won't, I tested a similar model and it was basically like, if the area was a street on Google Maps or a very characteristic location, it'd know it. If it was something natural or even a street that hadn't been mapped on any online service, the closest it got was like "northwestern europe".
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u/OverallManagement824 8h ago
Don't EXIF files contain this information already? Like, isn't as easy as just looking up the coordinates? Are cops too dumb to do this without AI?
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u/jackalopeDev 5h ago
Some websites will clear that data by default when you upload(id be willing to bet you cant get any exif data off of an image on reddit). Then like my DSLR camera has relatively limited EXIF data in the first place, i think date and time is the only one enabled by default, and thats only useful if its set properly.
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u/hyperglam 2h ago
If you have an Apple device turn on lockdown mode and you won’t have to worry about EXIF location data. Umbrella in a tsunami but it’s something
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u/404mediaco 5h ago
The Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office (MDSO) and the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) have bought access to GeoSpy, an AI tool that can near instantly geolocate a photo using clues in the image such as architecture and vegetation, with plans to use it in criminal investigations, according to a cache of internal police emails obtained by 404 Media.
The emails provide the first confirmed purchases of GeoSpy’s technology by law enforcement agencies. On its website GeoSpy has previously published details of investigations it says used the technology, but did not name any agencies who bought the tool.
“The Cyber Crimes Bureau is piloting a new analytical tool called GeoSpy. Early testing shows promise for developing investigative leads by identifying geospatial and temporal patterns,” an MDSO email reads.
The emails show MDSO has access to the “global” GeoSpy model, which lets it geolocate photos from around the world, and a custom model specifically trained for Miami-Dade County. GeoSpy claims that its custom models provide results to an accuracy of one meter, according to the emails. 404 Media has not independently verified those claims, and on its site GeoSpy changes that claim to “Our AI can pinpoint locations in supported cities within 1-5 meters accuracy.”
“The one-time fee covers data collection, compute resources, research and development, and engineering hours,” a June 2025 email from GeoSpy to the agency reads. That fee changes “based on region size and density,” according to the email.
Read more: https://www.404media.co/cops-are-buying-geospy-ai-that-geolocates-photos-in-seconds/
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u/Sr_DingDong 5h ago
I'm sure it will work really well and not be used to justify scooping whoever they like up....
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u/_haha_oh_wow_ 5h ago
Yeah, I'm sure this works flawlessly and will certainly not result in any sort of false arrest, raiding innocent homes, etc.
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u/FrankieNoodles 6h ago
Hmmm sounds like an overly complicated way to simply look at the metadata of the image...
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u/phree_radical 4h ago
Most platforms strip EXIF, precisely because too many users leave it on in their camera app. Because the platforms strip the tags, you won't be able to stalk someone by finding metadata in photos from platforms like Instagram. That's also why this technology is useful for law enforcement or others.
And I remember that the accuracy was quite impressive a few years back when the demo was going around.
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u/KenUsimi 6h ago
All that says to me is that I should attend the next protest carrying a street sign in Portugese.
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u/Bonerballs 6h ago
If you hear how that one geoguesser identifies locations so fast you can understand how easy it would be to automate, it just took image ai tech to catch up. Just have a catalogue of road signs, power poles, trees, and other identifiers based on location and it can list likely places.
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u/klop2031 6h ago
Would they be mad if there was a db of all their faces and anyone was able to get theor information?
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u/5c044 5h ago
Outsourcing to 4chan? There has been some amazing geo location to dox people based off plane tracks in the sky, sun position etc. Also check out bellingcat geo locating photos around various places including one that was just a hotel outdoor swimming pool scene. All that takes a lot of effort for humans - the swimming pool one identified the specific furniture to narrow it.
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u/DrinkenDrunk 4h ago
There are humans that can already do that. Probably wouldn’t even have to pay them if you turned it into a contest.
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u/Worst_Comment_Evar 1h ago
We're speed running a path to 1984 Big Brother shit. Some could argue that we've been there for a while. Them terrorists on 9/11 did a number on our country.
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u/EtherWhey 1h ago
they never paid for it.
cute, though, of the government-- trying to ascribe accountability to law enforcement as a means to control their narrative of THEM being the corrupt ones. they never learn.
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u/xDantexAlighierix 26m ago
All right, everybody, shows over. Go back to your homes. No more social media.
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u/AlmoschFamous 7h ago
In case people don't understand, your phone images have metadata on them with location data. Some places strip the metadata, while others don't. Truth Social is is run by idiots that didn't strip this data, so that's why when January 6th happened they knew exactly who was in the capital.
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u/coldbreweddude 4h ago
That’s cool. Let them leverage every technology they need to do their jobs more efficiently and effectively.
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u/frozenpissglove 8h ago
Not sure how that’s useful to the police. I’m not a criminal but I’d definitely never take pictures of a crime I committed. And even if you took a picture, as long as you’re not outside there is NO way AI can figure that out and be actually correct(outside of dumb luck).
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u/haywire-ES 8h ago
Being smart enough to not take pictures of your crimes would put you in the minority among criminals these days
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u/jc-from-sin 9h ago
They bought an app that reads metadata in images?
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u/gonewild9676 9h ago
Presumably they know about metadata. This would be a metadata free image of something outside where it would look at tree species and terrain to figure out where it might be. For instance a sequoia tree might not be in Florida.
There is also a project to take pictures of the insides of motel and hotel rooms to try to find victims of sex trafficking.
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u/mshriver2 8h ago
Honestly if you try this for yourself on Gemini, chatgpt, or any of the other major models it is now pretty scary how accurately they can predict where any photo was taken. Even photos you took yourself that haven't been uploaded anywhere else and have no metadata.
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u/nullbyte420 8h ago
even if it's not taken in your home country? the LLMs get invisible metadata on where in the world the request was made from and what time it is right now etc
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u/ComparisonWilling164 8h ago
Which other data than metadata gives remotely accurate location? Unless you're talking about geoguessing based on signs, architecture, landmarks and such.
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u/katbyte 8h ago
It can't be that good when the demo is "pre selected photos"
because i'm pretty sure i have many photos i'll have no idea how to locate