When a roving security robot called the K5 was unveiled late last week by a Silicon Valley startup called Knightscope, the company went a little nuts with its monikers. The press release described the machine as "R2-D2 meets Robocop." But Knightscope founder and CEO William Li said he prefers "R2-D2 meets Batman."
That's not it either, really. After seeing it in action, I can confirm that the K5, which is shaped like a 5-foot-tall bullet, has very little in common with the Dark Knight. It doesn't exactly leap into action wearing a cape to prevent a crime; it has a hard enough time figuring out whether a human being has drawn a gun. (Li laments that it's very easy to get false positives with children's toy guns.)
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Here's what the K5 would do in a shooting situation: Its cameras might make out some humans lying down all of a sudden, while others are running around. Its electronic ears would detect elevated noise levels. Then the software would put two and two together and contact its superiors.
Oh, and it can monitor social media feeds nearby for words of distress. The best you could do for a bat signal would be to tweet at it.
Aside from all that, the K5 can read license plates in the parking lot, scanning for stolen vehicles or sex offenders. It can be programmed to wish your customers a nice day, or to whistle reassuringly down a dark alley. And all for the low, low cost of about $6.50 an hour, a boon for the turnover-ridden security guard business. (The company's business model is "machine-as-a-service," i.e., it rents them out.)
This is less Robocop than a cross between Robbie the Robot and Paul Blart, Mall Cop.
The first robotic comparison that came to mind, as I watched it trundle around a carpeted suite at the Hyatt near San Francisco International Airport, wasn't R2-D2. I've gotten to know Artoo very well in recent months of reporting on the Star Wars clubs that make movie-grade versions of him, and the one thing I've learned about that guy is he's a showboat. He loves nothing more than bleeping, swiveling his dome fast and batting his radar eye at you.

No, the K5 is much more workaday. It may attract attention at first — "we've been getting a lot of double takes and big smiles," said Li of the robot's maiden voyage around the Hyatt. But the really odd thing about our conversation was how fast the K5 seemed to blend into the background. Not that it's a master of disguise; it's just the kind of thing you get over very quickly.
That's why I started thinking of the K5 as a Roomba, the popular disc-shaped robotic vacuum cleaner. Both set paths for themselves (around the room or around the mall). Both charge themselves when their batteries are low (the Roomba returns to its charging station; the K5 will roll over a charging mat every so often during its patrols, and upload video and other data it's captured while charging. (Urgent video can be sent faster via cellular networks; the K5 has the ability to send 90 terabytes of data per year per unit.)

The Roomba became a fact of life in many households very quickly. These days, to get people to notice one, you have to stick a cat dressed as a shark on top of it. My sense is that we'll soon start to think of the K5 in malls and office buildings in much the same way: a plastic robot worker going about its business.
Kids may be interested in trying to vandalize it, of course, but the K5 is covered in the same vandal-proof plastic coating in wide use on mass transit. "We've got cameras on it, we've got sirens," says Li. "If anyone's getting too close, we can sound an ear-piercing screech." Perhaps the most effective thing you could do would be to stick a "kick me" sign on its back.
Ultimately, Li and his co-founder Stacy Dean Stephens — a former cop — believe the K5 can cut crime by 50% in any environment you care to stick it in. "Criminals are looking for the path of least resistance," says Li. "Are you really going to go into a community with 200 droids roaming around? No, you're going to go into the next neighborhood."
Not that most private or public customers are going to rent 200 of the machines, but Knightscope will recommend at least three units per customer for redundancy: "One you're going to break, one you're going to lose and one you actually use," as Stephens puts it. "Cops will break anything and everything and two times on Sundays."

Cutting crime by 50% is a bold claim. Even if the K5 doesn't live up to it, though, there are domino effects from having one patrolling around. Knightscope operates out of a Silicon Valley accelerator for insurance startups, and roving anti-crime robots could allow insurance companies to create dynamic profiles — that is, reduce your premiums in months where there doesn't seem to be a lot going on by giving you a realistic monthly assessment of the safety of an area.
Inevitably, there will be privacy concerns. Here's a machine that roves around taking your picture and video without explicit consent, checks your license plate and your social media feed, and can even overhear your conversations. Then again, it wasn't like law enforcement and security guards couldn't do any of these things already. Those CCTV cameras aren't just for show.

As befits a startup looking to make headlines, Knightscope takes a pugnacious attitude towards privacy advocates. "We've heard this type of surveillance puts people on edge," says Li. "You know what puts me on edge? Getting shot at." He also posits a parent-friendly scenario: the K5 can use its facial recognition and license plate-spotting skills to make sure the right kids are getting in the right cars out of school.
The K5, then, seems to have a number of irresistible arguments in its corner. It is cheaper than regular security. It should reduce your premiums. It can keep you and your family safer. And it rolls around at a top speed of 18 mph, looking very non-threatening. Putting them in schools, as Knightscope wants to do, may be a hurdle too far for now. But once the company ships its first machines in 2015, expect to see a K5 or three quietly patrolling a mall near you.
Images: Knightscope