Cops alerted by AI gun detection system arrest high school student holding bag of Doritos — eight cars sent to disarm chip-toting teen

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After Omnilert AI detects a gun on campus, there is supposed to be a human verification step before the cops are called.

Omnilert’s active shooter and gun detection system misfired over Doritos
(Image credit: Omnilert / Pepsico)

A young student was left traumatized after being ordered to the ground and handcuffed by police because an AI gun detection system erroneously called the cops on his Doritos habit.

Taki Allen ate the bag of chips while waiting to be picked up from Kenwood High School, Baltimore, last Monday night (Oct 20), reports WBAL-TV 11 News. Football practice was over, and the student was sitting with friends outside the school. However, his crunchy repast triggered the school’s security camera Omnilert AI system.

20 minutes after he began chomping on the savory corn-based treat, eight police cars arrived in response to Allen’s snack habit. He was quickly ordered to his knees by armed police, and his hands were cuffed behind his back. “It was a scary situation,” Allen explained to WBAL-TV.

It didn’t take long before the AI error became apparent to all involved. Police were pleasingly transparent about the AI snafu, though. According to the student’s interview with local news, he was shown an image explaining the sizable police response. However, the picture puzzled him. “I was just holding a Doritos bag — it was two hands and one finger out, and they said it looked like a gun,” Allen said to WBAL-TV 11 News.

Sadly, the TV news cameras didn’t turn their attention to Allen’s explanatory gesturing when he seemingly demonstrated the pose that got him cuffed. We also haven't seen a copy of the AI-triggering scene from the night. So, we are left with a cautionary tale without clear guidance about how to safely cradle a bag of Doritos.

Omnilert AI at fault?

Omnilert was the AI gun detection software company behind this high-profile firearms hallucination. The firm refused to give WBAL-TV 11 News any comment on the emergency response callout error. It said that it “doesn't comment on internal school procedures” (WBAL-TV quote, not Omnilert’s exact words).

We checked out Omnilert’s School Security Systems product pages for more information about how its product works. One of the big attractions of Omnilert is that it can piggyback on arrays of security cameras that are already installed. Its publicity material name checks school shooting tragedies like Uvalde, Sandy Hook, and Parkland, thus implying that Omnilert might have prevented them.

Omnilert’s active shooter and gun detection system is purportedly a three-step process. After a positive AI gun detection, there supposedly follows a human verification step, before the automated notification and emergency response.

Image 1 of 4
Omnilert’s active shooter and gun detection system
(Image credit: Omnilert)

However, we can’t point to any of those processes being in error if the police also thought the Doritos-in-hand photo was ‘gun-like’ enough to send a response team of eight cars. The WBAL-TV report suggests that the officers had a copy of the AI-triggering scene with them, to show the astonished Allen, but we aren't 100% clear about the reveal timeline.

Omnilert and the school have offered to provide counseling to the students involved in the incident.

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Mark Tyson
Mark Tyson
News Editor

Mark Tyson is a news editor at Tom's Hardware. He enjoys covering the full breadth of PC tech; from business and semiconductor design to products approaching the edge of reason.

9 Comments Comment from the forums
  • Trúmplestiltskin
    Or Americans could, you know, do something about their stupid gun laws that see kids gunned down on a regular basis and make it necessary to monitor children for guns in schools.

    Until then...thoughts and prayers !
    Reply
  • hotaru251

    Omnilert and the school have offered to provide counseling to the students involved in the incident.

    Teen should milk it and file a lawsuit for stress and trauma.

    The fact is either it ignored the human verification step or the systems so bad it made it look like a gun it can't be trusted.


    This error wasted the officers time, gave a student unneeded stress, & did nothing beneficial.

    Trúmplestiltskin said:
    do something about their stupid gun laws that see kids gunned down on a regular basis
    as an American if I was a parent I would home school them...no way I would trust the school system to keep children safe anymore.
    Reply
  • Crazyy8
    This event actually happened at the High School near me, my high school and all others in Baltimore county have this system and have had it. I believe this is the second time this has happened with the system, the first being when another student was holding a hall pass shaped like a hand drill. I do believe the system is useful, as there have been multiple situations where a student has threatened to bring a gun or has brought a gun to BCPS high schools in recent months. Nonetheless, this error in the system needs to be fixed and I have sympathy for the student who had to go through the ordeal.
    Reply
  • Zaranthos
    At least AI sees the danger of ultra-processed foods.
    Reply
  • Pierce2623
    Trúmplestiltskin said:
    Or Americans could, you know, do something about their stupid gun laws that see kids gunned down on a regular basis and make it necessary to monitor children for guns in schools.

    Until then...thoughts and prayers !
    You have to go through a government background check to buy a gun. I’ve done it many times.
    Reply
  • Tanakoi
    Trúmplestiltskin said:
    Or Americans could, you know, do something about their stupid gun laws that see kids gunned down on a regular basis...
    During my high school and college years, it was legal to bring firearms to campus, and yet we never had a single school shooting the entire time (nor in the 50+ years beforehand).

    Now these schools are all "gun free zones" with firearms banned by multiple local, state, and federal laws, and yet shootings are a near-daily occurrence. Even someone using a big purple crayon can connect the dots on that one.
    Reply
  • ohio_buckeye
    As a gun owner myself, there’s also this thing called personal responsibility. Keep your weapons secure and teach your kids about them so they don’t get to them. I was raised around them and no issues. The gun laws aren’t the problem. In fact there are too many of them imo.
    Reply
  • ingtar33
    hotaru251 said:
    as an American if I was a parent I would home school them...no way I would trust the school system to keep children safe anymore.
    especially since your kids are 10x more likely to be molested by a school teacher then a priest. Yeah, i would keep my kids far away from the public schools.
    Reply
  • Gururu
    While this system is in its infant phase, would rather have a few false positives than a few false negatives. Jury still out on those. Not sure what the big deal is unless the cops were to have beat him senseless. The only real gun law the U.S. has is the 2nd amendment. The rest are just NRA constructs to protect wealth and keep the prisons full.
    Reply