Welcome back to our series on AI redaction. In our previous chapters, we’ve discussed the unique challenges facing redaction in the digital age, redacting legal documents using artificial intelligence, and the best practices for redaction. In this chapter, we’ll dive into AI-powered redaction and its impact on redaction software. 

Summary

Public safety and justice agencies handle massive amounts of sensitive data when dealing with media evidence. Before the advent of automated redaction software, redacting audio and video evidence was a time-consuming, tedious process. With AI redaction and redaction software, however, this once-laborious process becomes much more streamlined and efficient, allowing legal teams law enforcement, public safety, and justice agencies to keep witnesses and sensitive information safe and protected.  

What is automated redaction using AI?

In past chapters, we’ve covered the types of personally identifiable information (PII) that needs to be redacted and the different types of files, such as documents, video, and audio data, that could hold this information.

While each of these mediums presents different challenges, the most time-consuming is data involving audio and video. But, instead of going through a piece of video evidence frame-by-frame, AI-powered redaction uses artificial intelligence to automate the redaction process. 

In automating the redaction process, redaction software can help ensure that sensitive information embedded in audio or video evidence, like security or body-cam footage, is managed in a way that protects the privacy of individuals. 

One of the main benefits of using automated redaction software is the immense savings in time, which allows police departments, justice agencies, and legal teams to focus their resources on their other duties, instead of keeping personnel trapped at a desk pouring over evidence. Since personnel needs to be paid, saving time also saves these organizations money. In addition, using AI to accelerate the redaction process removes the human element of error, improving the accuracy of evidence redaction and guaranteeing sensitive information is protected. 

Instead of manually pixellating, cutting, or blacking out PII like in the past, automated redaction software allows a user to more easily select things like faces, license plates, names, and other PII which the software then tracks. For example, rather than needing to blur a face in every single frame, a user would simply select the face once and allow the software to obscure that face for the rest of the video. 

That being said, not all AI redaction software can keep up with the intense demands and compliance regulations that law enforcement and legal teams need. Fortunately, there are certain products and services, like Veritone Redact and Redact Managed Service, that can.

How Veritone Redact and Redact Managed Service work

Veritone Redact is a cloud-based application that automates obscuring sensitive imagery or audio content in media evidence. This software (and sister service, Redact Managed Service, which runs on the same software) is capable of automatically identifying PII, like heads, license plates, and laptops, and displaying the results in chronological order. Users are also able to independently select PII to obscure, like ID cards or officer notebooks, and have the option to let Veritone Redact track the obscured item in the rest of the video. 

Additionally, users can define a redacted zone manually and follow that zone with their cursor while the video plays, redacting the area their cursor follows. Of course, the keystone of Veritone Redact is its ability to redact detected and user-defined objects quickly—saving up to 90% of the time manual redaction would normally take. Because Veritone Redact automatically identifies PII, it is capable of catching sensitive information to redact that a human might have missed. 

Imagine being tasked with redacting sensitive information in a video file being used as evidence in a criminal investigation. Odds are, this video is of a crime, and it could include sensitive information that isn’t relevant to that investigation. 

For example, say the video evidence in question is of a man being assaulted in his home while preparing his taxes. Obviously, the victim’s tax information isn’t relevant to the fact that his home was broken into and he was violently attacked—this is information that should be redacted. 

The AI platform at the core of Veritone Redact, aiWARE, is capable of identifying the heads of everyone on video, the computer screen the victim was preparing his taxes on, and any sensitive documents he might have had on his desk at the time of the attack without user input. It will then obscure that imagery, keeping the victim’s PII private and safe. 

Veritone Redact also enables legal and law enforcement teams to search audio files and documents to find information while keeping a redaction log, maintaining compliance with other laws and regulations, and fulfilling chain of custody requirements.

Applications of Veritone Redact

While Veritone Redact was developed for use by law enforcement, justice agencies, and legal practices specifically, it has many other applications across other industries:

  • B2C Businesses: Using the audio redaction capabilities of Veritone Redact, a customer service line for a financial institution, like a bank or credit union, can use recordings of customer calls for training purposes without revealing the customer’s sensitive information, like their name, address, and social security number. 
  • Education:  An online teacher might lean on Veritone Redact to protect their students’ privacy if that teacher ever uploads a recording of the class session to an online platform. 
  • Healthcare: A childcare or healthcare facility could use the video redaction capabilities of Veritone Redact to protect the identities of children, patients, faculty, and staff during any video examination of that facility.
  • And more

 

Conclusion

Thank you for taking the time to learn more about Veritone Redact’s AI-powered redaction software and service. Here, we’ve discussed how Veritone Redact can help streamline the redaction process for media evidence of several varieties and how this tool can increase the accuracy of redaction services. We’ve also described uses for Veritone Redact that lay outside of the law enforcement and justice agency sphere. 

In our coming chapters, we’ll dive into the ins and outs of video and audio redaction, the unique challenges this medium presents, how it’s used across different industries, and more.

If you or your team are interested in AI-powered automated redaction software or redaction services, one of our Veritone team members can help you learn more about our offerings.