Hong Kong explores use of AI to capture high rise litterers

Secretary for Housing Winnie Ho Wing-yin said the use of AI to help authorities capture high rise litterers has been satisfactory, after the official visited Yau Tong Estate to observe the implementation of smart estate management in public housing.

To enhance the effectiveness and quality of public housing estate management, the Housing Authority has introduced innovative technologies to promote smart estate management and has selected 10 estates as pilots.

In response to the persistent issue of high-rise littering, which incurs a deduction of 7 points under the existing demerit point system for public housing tenants, the Housing Department has introduced AI-powered smart cameras to identify offenders and track the movement of thrown objects in real-time.

Ho said this technology significantly reduces the time and manpower required to review CCTV footage manually.

“By automatically detecting anomalies in the video feed, the AI system can swiftly pinpoint the units involved in high-rise littering incidents, issue warning notices, and deduct points accordingly,” said Ho, adding that tenants who were penalized have refrained from repeating the offense, demonstrating the effectiveness of these measures.

Meanwhile, legislative councilors and district councilors who were present during the visit called on the Housing Authority to further leverage technology to address issues such as noise disturbances and also raised concerns about the number and coverage of the smart cameras.

In response, the authority said it has achieved the goal of having at least one mobile surveillance camera installed for each estate since 2020, with over 190 such cameras installed across public housing estates since last year.

The authority said it would periodically review and adjust the placement of cameras to target various issues within the estates and also explore the usage of smart cameras to tackle illegal dumping activities.