US security agencies are planning to use quadrupedal robots to patrol their southern border.
The United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is working with its Science and Technology Directorate to explore the use of “robot dogs” to patrol the southern border with Mexico.
The agency is deploying Spot -like robots to patrol stretches of terrain that could be dangerous for human patrollers.
“The southern border can be an inhospitable place for man and beast, and that’s exactly why a machine can excel there ,” said DHS’s Brenda Long.
robot dogs
The show has partnered with Ghost Robots, a Philadelphia-based company that has already worked with big companies like Verizon.
Boston Dynamics , the best-known quadrupedal robotics firm, has not been among the names , despite earlier talks with DARPA.
For its part, Ghost Robots indicates that it is proud to partner with the US government, and takes an agnostic position on payloads.
“We don’t do the payloads. Are we going to promote and advertise any of these weapon systems? Probably not ,” Ghost Robots CEO Jiren Parikh said in an interview last year with Techcrunch . ” That’s a tough question to answer. Because we’re selling to the military, we don’t know what they do with them. We’re not going to dictate to our government customers how they use the robots.”