Delhi Police use AI to identify masked snatcher, recover stolen phone

New Delhi: Delhi Police has used Artificial Intelligence (AI) to unmask a masked snatcher, who had snatched and run away with the mobile phone of a woman in north Delhi, an official said on Tuesday.

The accused, Afnan Ali, was seen committing the crime on a CCTV camera footage but his identity remained a puzzle for the cops as he was wearing a mask.

"The incident was reported on November 24 when the complainant told the police that her mobile phone was snatched near Tyre Market," Deputy Commissioner of Police (north) Raja Banthia said.

The complainant stated that an unknown person approached her from behind, snatched her mobile phone and fled towards Gali Tyre Wali, Sadar Bazar.

Accordingly, a case was registered and a team was formed to catch the culprit at the earliest.

"We started working on the CCTV cameras and the route of the snatcher was followed. In one of the footage, the accused was captured while running after snatching the mobile phone of the complainant," said the DCP.

But the identity of the accused could not be established as he was wearing a mask.

"At this juncture, the technically sound team of investigators used the technique of Artificial Intelligence to virtually remove the mask from the screengrab of the CCTV footage video. His mask was removed with the help of AI techniques and a blurred picture of the accused was extracted," Banthia said.

The accused was finally identified as Afnan Ali (23), a resident of Sadar Bazar, with the help of technical surveillance. A raid was conducted and he was nabbed.

The cops recovered the snatched mobile phone and seized the clothes worn by the accused at the time of the crime.

The interrogation of the accused revealed that he was released from Tihar Jail just seven days before the incident and had again started committing the crime.