Questions arise about using AI tools to fight crime

As artificial intelligence technology advances, law enforcement agencies are increasingly using AI tools to help solve crimes — and even put people behind bars. But now one of those tools, a program known as Cybercheck, is in the hot seat.

Cybercheck “uses advanced machine learning algorithms to analyze massive amounts of data, including witness statements, digital forensics, mobile beacons, and other cyber profiling data,” according to its website. This can be particularly helpful in finding evidence that human investigators might have missed. However, several investigators have cited problems with the AI tool and criticized its founder, Adam Mosher.

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That includes Adarus Black, who was sentenced to life in prison after being found guilty of murder with a firearm. Prosecutors “had no direct evidence tying Black to the murder scene,” Business Insider said, but Mosher testified in court that Cybercheck used its algorithm to triangulate Black’s cellphone and “placed it within a few feet of the crime scene with over 90% accuracy.” The jury later “said they would not have convicted Black without Mosher and his Cybercheck report.”

But while there are concerns about the program’s methodology, defense attorneys “face the difficult task of disputing the credibility of evidence generated using AI,” he told Business Insider. Companies like Cybercheck can “argue that the algorithms and training data that power these AI tools are proprietary trade secrets of the private companies that develop them, and therefore cannot be disclosed.” Prosecutors often don’t have access to the AI’s source code, meaning “local judges, who likely don’t have PhDs in computer science or an understanding of advanced matrix math, must decide whether to grant access to the defense.” Mosher’s court testimony also drew criticism, as one attorney “pointed out inconsistencies in Mosher’s resume, including trials he claims to have testified at that never happened, and a peer review at a university that was never conducted.”

In addition to investigations into Cybercheck and similar programs, there are also challenges in courtrooms. In one case in Akron, Ohio, a company analyzing evidence in a murder case “filed a report to the court questioning the ‘accuracy and legality of the CyberCheck system’ for producing two identical reports with different dates,” Business Insider told Business Insider. The report added that “it is improbable that the same number of hits on a cyber profile, for the same cyber profile, were received by the same wireless routers at the same time on two different days.”

As Cybercheck has spread, “defense lawyers have questioned its accuracy and reliability. Its methodology is unclear, they said, and has not been independently verified,” said NBC News, which also published an investigative report on Cybercheck. By 2023, the tool “had been used in nearly 8,000 cases in 40 states and nearly 300 agencies,” but some judges and prosecutors have objected to its use. In New York, a judge “barred authorities from introducing Cybercheck evidence last year after finding that prosecutors had failed to show it was credible or widely accepted, according to the ruling,” while in another Ohio case, a judge “blocked Cybercheck’s analysis when Mosher refused to disclose the software’s methodology.”

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Why is Cybercheck being questioned?