Pesky Parking Tickets? There's an App for That

An intrepid student has created a simple chatbot program that helps people get out of parking tickets.

1 minute read

July 4, 2016, 11:00 AM PDT

By James Brasuell @CasualBrasuell


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Don Blais / Shutterstock

Cyrus Farivar reports: "Joshua Browder, a 19-year-old British student at Stanford University, has created a chatbot (DoNotPay.co.uk) that successfully challenged parking tickets in London and New York City."

The chatbot works by asking a few simple questions (via AI or webform) and then auto-generating a legal appeal for the parking ticket.

Browder claims that the chatbot has challenged 160,000 parking tickets so far, and has a "low 60 percent" success rate in beating the rap. Browder also credits the success rate to overzealous implementation of parking regulations. Browder also says that the model is likely to work in other cities, because "If it can work in New York it can work anywhere." Seattle is the next target.

Thursday, June 30, 2016 in Ars Technica

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I love the variety of courses, many practical, and all richly illustrated. They have inspired many ideas that I've applied in practice, and in my own teaching. Mary G., Urban Planner

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