“We are Not Ready for That”: Police Views on the Use of Generative AI to Create Public Security Threats

In this exploratory study, we raise the spectre of the potential misuse of artificial intelligence (AI) with interviewees as a means of examining the extent to which Canadian police are prepared for this potential security threat. In-depth qualitative interviews were conducted with twenty-two (n=22) municipal, regional, provincial and national police leaders from across Canada. In these interviews, we asked for their views on two questions: 1) whether the police consider the malicious use of generative AI a legitimate public safety concern, and 2) the extent to which Canadian policing is equipped to respond to the use of deepfakes as a public security threat. Analysis of our interview data revealed that, although some preliminary discussions have taken place at the provincial and federal levels, Canadian policing remains inadequately prepared for this threat. To help contextualize both the threat and the resulting national security gap, this study draws on Cronin’s (2022) work on the adoption of open technological innovations by terrorist groups, as well as other recent papers on malevolent innovation.