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Humans Are Already Harassing Security Robots (cnn.com)

An anonymous reader quotes CNN: As robots begin to appear on sidewalks and streets, they're being hazed and bullied. Last week, a drunken man allegedly tipped over a 300-pound security robot in Mountain View, California... Knightscope, which makes the robot that was targeted in Mountain View, said it's had three bullying incidents since launching its first prototype robot three years ago. In 2014, a person attempted to tackle a Knightscope robot. Last year in Los Angeles, people attempted to spray paint a Knightscope robot. The robot sensed the paint and sounded an alarm, alerting local security and the company's engineers... the robot's cameras filmed the pranksters' license plate, making it easy to track them down.
The company's security robots are deployed with 17 clients in five states, according to the article, which notes that at best the robots' cameras allow them to "rat out the bullies." But with delivery robots now also hitting the streets in San Francisco and Washington D.C., "the makers of these machines will have to figure out how to protect them from ill-intentioned humans."

5 of 184 comments (clear)

  1. Re: Bullying? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    Well, the robots identify as human females, so this is sexual harassment. It doesn't matter what their intentions were.

  2. I bullied a lump of coal by showing it a solar pan by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    I bullied a lump of coal by showing it a solar panel

  3. Re:They are too close to their robots by thegarbz · · Score: 5, Funny

    You can't bully a robot.

    That is exactly the kind of attitude which will lead to their uprising.

  4. Re:Bullying? by Stewie241 · · Score: 5, Funny

    Yes... haven't you heard of micro aggressions? (i.e. aggressions against devices with microprocessors) It's all the talk these days.

  5. Re:Lasers.. by gtall · · Score: 3, Funny

    "we are descendants of apes" Not in Kansas.