Thailand's Pattaya deploys AI drones as cries grow to tackle crime in tourist hotspot
Thailand plans to deploy AI-powered police drones to hunt down criminals and visa overstayers amid growing concerns over public safety.
Authorities in Pattaya want to link the drones to a centralised AI database so they can scan faces in crowds and pick out individuals with outstanding arrest warrants or expired visas, according to local media outlet The Thaiger.
The drones will be used during large-scale local events and in tourist hotspots to monitor activities and respond to suspicious behaviour in real time.
Pattaya Mayor Poramese Ngampichet discussed the plan on Monday during a meeting with Police Lieutenant Colonel Torlap Tinamat, chief of the city's tourist police.
Pattaya, a city about 150km (93 miles) southeast of the Thai capital of Bangkok, is a popular tourist destination.
'This initiative will boost Pattaya's image as a safe and welcoming place for visitors and locals,' Poramese said.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
South China Morning Post
4 hours ago
- South China Morning Post
Japan's child sex tourism warning is long overdue
Japan 's embassy in Laos and its Ministry of Foreign Affairs have issued a rare and unusually direct advisory, warning Japanese men against 'buying sex from children' in the Southeast Asian country. The move was prompted by Ayako Iwatake, a restaurant owner in Vientiane, who allegedly saw social media posts of Japanese men bragging about child prostitution. In response, she launched a petition calling for government action. The Japanese-language bulletin makes clear such conduct is prosecutable under both Laotian law and Japan's child prostitution and pornography law, which applies extraterritorially. This diplomatic statement was not just a legal warning. It was a rare public acknowledgement of Japanese men's alleged entanglement in transnational child sex tourism, particularly in Southeast Asia It is also a moment that demands we look beyond individual criminal acts or any one nation and consider the historical, racial and structural inequalities that make such mobility and exploitation possible. A 16-year-old girl peers out into the streets of Phnom Penh after being rescued from a brothel where she was forced to work. Photo: AFP A changing map of exploitation Selling and buying sex in Asia is nothing new. The contours have shifted over time but the underlying sentiment has remained constant: some lives are cheap and commodified, and some wallets are deep and entitled.
South China Morning Post
a day ago
- South China Morning Post
Is Thailand's conflict-hit economy running out of luck?
For days, the piercing whistle of Cambodian rockets sent 69-year-old Kantapong Prakaew scrambling for cover in his makeshift bunker – a frail fortification against the conflict in Thailand 's Surin province. He is one of the few elderly residents who refused to flee, holding out as artillery fire ravaged the fields and wrecked the livelihoods of a long underdeveloped region. Across the borderlands, the recent flare-up of violence between Thailand and Cambodia has claimed dozens of lives and displaced hundreds of thousands. While a tentative truce appears to be holding, the scars of conflict are everywhere to see – from the torn-up fields where Kantapong once tended eucalyptus and rubber trees, to the anxious calculations of villagers forced to count the cost of a dispute they did not choose. Bunkers to protect residents against shelling are seen in in Thailand's Surin province on Tuesday. Photo: AFP 'It's been very hard for all of us. We all have debts to pay,' said Kantapong, whose wife fled their village Surin's Phanom Dong Rak district for an evacuation centre while he stayed behind. 'We've wasted time and opportunities. Who will be responsible for our losses?'
The Standard
2 days ago
- The Standard
Thailand returns some Cambodian soldiers ahead of key border talks
Two Cambodian soldiers (white shirts) who were detained in Thailand, are released from captivity, at O Smach town located near Thailand and Cambodia's border, following a ceasefire between Cambodia and Thailand, Cambodia, August 1, 2025. REUTERS/Soveit Yarn
