Minority Report, in Real Life?

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The ultimate fantasy of criminology is a world completely devoid of crime. Most would say that the idea of such a world is just that: a fantasy. The blockbuster 2002 movie Minority Report, however, explored what it would mean for the concept to become a reality. In the film, crime is stricken from the country because sophisticated beings called “precogs” are able to predict it, and then law enforcement is able to stop it before it happens. Though most dismissed this notion as completely unrealistic, many will be shocked to learn that the world portrayed in the movie may not be so far off. Sophisticated computer algorithms developed and utilized by police departments have been able to predict crime with a surprising amount of success, by plugging in huge quantities of data that map out past crimes. And though we can’t yet – and probably never will – be able to predict specific instances of crime, we can now know where and when a crime is likely to occur. And that, for criminologists, is a huge success.