The Fast Saga: What Is God's Eye And How Does It Work?
In his quest to torment and (eventually) murder Dominic Toretto (Vin Diesel) for the death of his father and the destruction of his family's criminal empire, "Fast X"'s Dante Reyes (Jason Mamoa) has a wealth of resources at his command. Yet, in an arsenal that includes deadly mercenaries, advanced explosives, and more cars than could fill a highway, the greatest tool he has access to is the machine known as "God's Eye."
God's Eye is an immensely powerful technological device capable of hacking, compiling, and sorting massive amounts of data in a matter of minutes. Primarily, its main function is operating as a futuristic surveillance system that would give even Jonathan Nolan cause for concern. Come to think of it, the simple answer to this question is that if you've seen "The Dark Knight" or the series "Person of Interest," God's Eye is pretty much just a scaled-up version of the surveillance systems seen in those stories (save any algorithmic predictive crime solving).
Its history and exact operating procedures are far more complicated, however, and will require going back several years in The Fast Saga — while also trying to make sense of a couple of convoluted retcons. Then again, if God's Eye didn't have an ever-changing, amusingly overcooked backstory, it wouldn't be at home in this franchise in the first place.
The history of God's Eye in Fast and Furious
God's Eye was invented by Ramsey (Nathalie Emmanuel) sometime before the events of "Furious 7," and quickly attracted the attention of the sociopathic hacker-terrorist Cipher (Charlize Theron). Cipher hired the mercenary Mose Jakande (Djimon Honsou) to retrieve God's Eye on her behalf, but not before Ramsey sent it to a trusted friend in Abu Dabi for safekeeping.
Ramsey was briefly kidnapped by Jakande and subsequently saved by Dom's crew, who were operating at the behest of Mr. Nobody (Kurt Russell) and The Agency (apparently they were all in favor of giving a shady clandestine spy organization unconstitutional surveillance capabilities if it meant they could use it to beat up Jason Statham). Despite a few hiccups, Ramsey and her new teammates were able to secure God's Eye for The Agency and defeat Jakande for good.
In "The Fate of the Furious," however, Cipher steals the device for herself and uses it against Dom's former crew members (Toretto was working at the time for Cipher, for reasons far too baffling to get into here). Of course, she was eventually thwarted, and God's Eye was once again returned to The Agency.
What can God's Eye do, exactly?
Essentially, God's Eye is able to hack into any device with a camera, coordinate with facial recognition software, and tell its user where a specific human is located anywhere on the globe — so long as they've been seen by a photographic device. Though it may be confused by audiences as software or some sort of algorithm, it is seemingly portrayed throughout the series as a physical device that can be taken, well, physically.
It is unknown what limitations (if any) God's Eye has, or if it could be used to hack devices for purposes other than visual surveillance. For example, if it can hack into traffic cameras, it may be able to hack into computers to obtain personal information (though that may simply be an unnecessary application for the device, as Ramsey can do so without it). Despite being highly advanced, God's Eye is vulnerable to proximity-based hacking, should the hacker in question possess the right skills and equipment.
God's Eye has played a major role in almost every "Fast" film since its introduction, usually to let one side of the battle find the other without the need for creative problem-solving. Though it's refreshingly consistent for the franchise to keep the MacGuffin in play all these years later, they may just be reaching a narrative dead end where they need to decommission this predictable deus ex machina for good.