Tools and Weapons: The Promise and The Peril of the Digital Age

by Brad Smith

I mentioned that I had sat down for a cup of coffee on a recent Saturday morning with Steve Mylett, the police chief of Bellevue, the largest city outside Seattle. I had asked to meet to share concerns raised by some of our employees about racial challenges they sometimes face in the community, including their perceptions of local police. He was open and receptive to hearing my views, and he shared a fact that was new to me: The increase in housing prices meant that new Bellevue police officers could no longer afford to buy a home in the city they patrolled. Even the chief of police endured a commute of an hour each way to work. There was an important connection between our two points: It’s difficult to build a stronger connection between a community and its police force when local officers can’t afford to live close by. I shared the story with the group from Challenge Seattle and mentioned that I had asked our team at Microsoft to develop ideas for a new initiative. As Satya and I walked out of the breakfast together, I described them in more detail. By the time we reached the elevator, we had decided to make the initiative a priority. Back in Redmond, we put a data science team to work so we could better understand the problem. The team collaborated with Zillow to include real estate data, creating a bigger data set than had been available before. The insights were eye-opening, not only for us but ultimately for the entire region. The data showed that we had not just a h...