Officials stressed “AI City Brain” will not be used for crime-fighting or surveillance purposes, saying the aim is to improve day-to-day city management and emergency response.
Under the plan announced in Wednesday’s Policy Address, “AI City Brain” would “link up and consolidate relevant big data” and feed real-time information to government departments through “big data analytics”.
Chief Secretary Eric Chan, who will lead a task force to take forward the initiative, said HK$200 million has been earmarked for the first phase of the system’s buildout.
“Total budget is not yet… we do not have any estimation now, because you know that after six to nine years, I really don’t know how fast or how cheap the IT is, maybe the prices could go down quickly,” he said.
He added that by the third quarter of 2028, the system is expected to connect to the 1823 Contact Centre and the databases of emergency services.
“I want to reiterate that the “[AI] City Brain” system is not for crime detection. It is for city management. This is a very important principle,” he said.
“These computer systems, they’re now operating separately, independently, I would say, in different departments. But I think we want to, we want them to integrate into a single system, and adding the function of AI, then we can predict any disasters or any accidents from happening. This is a very, very important purpose.”
At the same press conference, Security Secretary Chris Tang said the new Huanggang port is expected to start operating by the fourth quarter of this year.
He said more than 100 system trials, stress tests and drills have been conducted so far, helping officials to rectify issues such as Wi-Fi connectivity and slippery driveways at the public transport interchange.