Robots Are Now Being Used To Enforce Social Distancing

During these trying times, robots have been implemented to enforce social distancing in certain locations. Some of these places are parks located in Singapore. Boston Dynamics’s four-legged ‘Spot’ robot is what is being used. The robot has a handler of sorts, waiting in the wings in case something extreme happens to the bot itself. 

Perhaps more things like this will slowly be integrated into society, to control people in some way or another. The mission of this robot is simple, to keep people in line and away from one another at all times publically to combat the pandemic happening. 

Boston Dynamics is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Japanese conglomerate SoftBank Group. The company was first founded back during 1992, as a spin-off of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Google-owner Alphabet Inc. previously agreed to sell their robotics firm to SoftBank Group. 

Boston Dynamics has also received funding from the US government’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. Through their use of innovative technologies, they have become both a pioneer and front runner with robotics in particular. Their robots are able to maneuver around difficult terrains and adapt to changes on the fly. 

A statement was released by Singapore’s National Parks Board. They said that the ‘Spot’ robot will traverse a 4-mile swath of Bishan-Ang Mo Kio Park during off-peak hours, while playing a recorded message that reminds park-goers ‘observe safe distancing measures.’

Also, the robot will be outfitted with cameras that are recording and capturing everything around it with playback mode enabled. A kind of video analytics will take place and then be used to estimate how many people are in the park at a time. Allegedly, the robot will not store anyone’s personal identity or be tracking specific individuals either.

Whether or not this will become more of a thing is unknown but certainly anyone has seen different movies with multiple robots wandering around. Skynet anyone?

(Source: https://www.freaklore.com/robots-are-now-being-used-to-enforce-social-distancing)