When Donald Trump ascended to office for the second time, he promised to deploy an arsenal of high-tech surveillance gadgetry on the already dystopian US-Mexico border. At that point, tech in question concerned devices like AI-integrated camera towers and robot dogs. Now, it seems the federal government is looking to kick things up a notch as it seeks companies to fulfill a contract for humanoid robots.
That’s according to Fox News, which reported that Department of Homeland Security officials have sat through at least one presentation from the humanoid robotics company Foundation.
Though it’s still pretty early for humanoid robotics as a whole — even the best still suffer from short battery life, dexterity challenges, and severe mobility limitations — the choice to test Foundation is revealing.
The company’s founder, Sankaet Pathak, has made it his goal not to build robots for utility, but explicitly for war. Earlier this year, it was revealed that Foundation had rolled out two of its ominous Phantom Mk-I humanoid robots to the frontlines of the Russo-Ukrainian war — the first time, it appears, that any humanoid robot has been deployed to an active combat theater.
