Atlanta and AI-powered surveillance

Public safety is a top priority for the Buckhead Coalition, a private, non-profit corporation created to improve the well-being of Buckhead’s residents and businesses. Atlanta Police Department’s Artificial Intelligence (AI) surveillance initiative ConnectAtlanta is a vital part of the Buckhead Coalition’s public safety mission.

“We are very supportive of Connect Atlanta and APD’s work on camera connectivity and have seen their results firsthand. The Buckhead CID’s investment in camera technologies in the Connect Atlanta network has directly contributed to the 27 percent net reduction in crime in Buckhead over the past 5 years”, says Katharine Kelley, CEO of the Buckhead Coalition and Buckhead CID via email.

According to a 2024 report, ConnectAtlanta plays a significant role in Atlanta’s status as the most surveilled city in America, with 124.14 cameras per 1,000 people.

What is ConnectAtlanta?

ConnectAtlanta is an AI-powered surveillance initiative that allows private citizens and businesses to voluntarily register or integrate their surveillance cameras into the Atlanta Police Department’s Video Surveillance Center. ConnectAtlanta has around 17,000 registered cameras that require law enforcement to request surveillance videos from owners, and around 29,000 integrated cameras that provide direct access to law enforcement.

ConnectAtlanta is powered by Fusus Real-Time Crime Center (RTCC) AI software that combines public and private camera feeds into a unified map-based surveillance platform that can be used by law enforcement and other first responders to improve rapid response to active emergency situations and enhance evidence collection for active investigations. Fusus is a part of Axon Enterprise, which currently dominates the law enforcement body camera market.

Privacy concerns surrounding AI-powered surveillance

Local officials insist that the expansion of the ConnectAtlanta AI-powered surveillance initiative in Atlanta can be an essential asset to crime reduction efforts.

In 2022, Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens encouraged city residents and businesses to join the ConnectAtlanta initiative with the goal of increasing the city’s surveillance capacity to help first responders with public safety efforts while maintaining privacy.

ConnectAtlanta is one of over 200 Axon Fusus Community Connect Initiatives nationwide.

According to a 2025 article, the increased utilization of AI surveillance tools, like Axon Fusus, by local law enforcement nationwide has contributed to the expansion of the police state in America.

The ACLU of Georgia has raised relevant constitutional concerns surrounding the recent proliferation of AI surveillance technology.

“The technology enables the government to engage in near-constant, suspicion-less monitoring of people going about their daily lives, infringing on Georgians’ Fourth Amendment rights to privacy. More fundamentally, the Fourth Amendment should set the floor for Georgians’ expectations of privacy, not the ceiling, which is why we need to implement policy at the local, state, and national levels to establish guidelines and provide much-needed transparency into how these technologies are being used,” said Shruti Lakshmanan, a Policy Advocate at the ACLU of Georgia, via email.

The ACLU of Georgia is currently working to bring their national ACLU’s Community Control Over Police Surveillance (CCOPS) campaign to Atlanta.

“The core idea behind CCOPS is simple: People deserve transparency, accountability, and democratic oversight before governments acquire powerful surveillance tools,” said Lakshmanan.

She continued: “Traditionally, surveillance technologies were often used to investigate specific suspicions. But AI-powered systems can now analyze massive amounts of video, photos, and other data to identify ‘patterns’ and generate suspicion in the first place. That shift raises serious concerns about accuracy and bias, particularly for communities that are already subject to over-surveillance. Historically and today, mass surveillance has disproportionately targeted and harmed protesters, immigrants, LGBTQ+ people, people seeking reproductive healthcare, and other marginalized communities.”