Features

INNOVATION: Following the recent launch of a new framework and principles for the “ethical and responsible” use of artificial intelligence (AI) across police forces by the Australia New Zealand Policing Advisory Agency (ANZPAA), Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons spoke to ANZPAA Policy & Research Officer Anastasia Pierakos about the aims of the guidance, the need to ensure the police use of AI is not “siloed” within specialist teams, and the importance of addressing issues such as transparency, accountability and oversight.

ANALYSIS: Findings of a study that focused on policing students’ decision-making suggest that while participants generally apply the National Decision Model impartially, subtle biases are evident in their reasoning processes; analysis also reveals that despite training efforts to reduce bias, socio-economic biases persist, influencing perceptions of suspects and victims – although not always resulting in overtly biased decisions – as study author and Professional Policing graduate Olivia Fowler explains.

FEATURE: A recent report into police-perpetrated family violence among officers from Australia’s Victoria Police is calling for an “urgent paradigm shift” away from the force’s role in responding to family violence to fund to more community-focused initiatives, amid concerns around a “culture of officers minimising and dismissing offending”, as well as colluding with perpetrators and misidentifying victim-survivors as perpetrators, as Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons reports.

OPINION: The collapse over the past decade of construction firms Carillion and ISG and provider Robin Hood Energy highlighted the dangers to public services and the risks for government of major single suppliers going bust; but as Content Guru Co-Founder and Deputy CEO Martin Taylor warns, the collapse of key policing supplier could disrupt critical communication channels, damage public confidence and compromise public safety – so what can forces be doing to reduce those risks?

INNOVATION: A recent Europol report on policing in an online world urges police forces to expand their online presence and work out how to address policing’s “capability and relevance gap” in the virtual world, or risk those online spaces becoming “lawless”; Europol also points to the success of countries such as Denmark and Norway in increasing their virtual police presence and engagement with communities, as Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons reports.

ANALYSIS: While many experts believe the illegal wildlife trade is closely linked to crimes such as human trafficking, drug smuggling and money laundering, evidence has been thin on the ground; now new research from the University of Oxford’s Dr Michelle Anagnostou, Stellenbosch University PhD candidate Ashwell Glasson, Dr Brent Doberstein of the University of Waterloo, and Dr Peter Stoett of Ontario Tech University highlights the intersection between wildlife crime and organised crime networks in Canada.

FEATURE: This week’s report published by the Environment and Climate Change Committee highlights the damage caused by organised waste crime in England, the “woeful” level of successful prosecutions, and the apparent lack of interest shown by the police in fulfilling their role; Policing Insight’s Andrew Staniforth looks at the findings of the report, as well as European efforts to tackle the issue.

INTERVIEW: Vehicle manufacturers and security companies are being urged to join police and other agencies in a new public-private partnership to tackle organised vehicle crime, which researchers believe costs the UK economy more than £1.75 billion a year, as Mark Kameen, a former senior police officer and now project lead for the National Vehicle Crime Reduction Partnership, explained to Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons.

INTERVIEW: After leading Merseyside Police for just over four years, Serena Kennedy recently stepped down from her role as the Chief Constable of the fifth largest force in England and Wales; speaking with Policing Insight’s James Sweetland shortly before her departure, she reflected on the changing nature of police leadership, debates about national reform, and shared her perspective on what the planned new National Centre of Policing (NCoP) should look like.

FEATURE: An Inspectorate report into the UK National Crime Agency’s National Data Exploitation Capability (NDEC) is warning that the Agency risks missing vital intelligence due in part to a mounting “technical debt” that means it spends much of its annual IT budget updating hundreds of legacy systems rather than investing in long-term technology solutions, with NDEC staff using outdated and obsolete IT when trying to work on large volumes of data, as Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons reports.

INNOVATION: As International Control Room Week gets underway, Essex Assistant Chief Constable Stuart Hooper, the National Police Chiefs’ Council Contact Operations Lead, outlines the development of AI Post-Call Analysis, which produces concise, easy-to-read summaries of all incoming control room contact and automatically categorises calls by topic to enable rapid retrieval and analysis – one of a tranche of technical innovations designed to help forces “move from overwhelmed to empowered”.

OPINION: With continuing UK protests fuelled by polarised views presenting ongoing problems for policing, former South Wales Police detective Steve Dodd, a subject matter expert on intelligence professionalisation and advocate of the community intelligence-led policing methodology (CILPM), explores how CILPM could enhance both the delivery and impact of the new neighbourhood policing focus, and feed into addressing the challenges of policing a fractured society.

ADVERTISEMENT FEATURE: As part of their daily policing work, Cheshire Constabulary officers routinely interact with all types of digital evidence. NiCE Investigate is transforming every aspect of how officers are managing digital evidence, from collecting CCTV footage and managing forensic evidence, to sharing evidence with the Crime Prosecution Service (CPS), and responding to crimes involving at-risk and vulnerable people.

FEATURE: An initiative placing police officers in classrooms to deliver a lesson to young people on sexual consent and the law has shown encouraging signs of improving trust and confidence in policing among pupils, as well as a better understanding of the law and an increased willingness to report breaches of consent to police, according to a College of Policing evaluation, as Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons reports.

OPINION: California has become the second US state to bring in legislation requiring transparent notice that artificial intelligence (AI) has been used to draft a police report; George Washington University’s Professor Andrew Guthrie Ferguson believes that, with officers in some states using predictive text to write formal statements based on audio transcripts from body-worn cameras, transparency, the training of AI models, and understanding the risks of relying on AI are among the issues that need to be examined.

FEATURE: A recent report into serious and organised crime (SOC) sets out the need for a new international alliance to “match the speed, reach and ambition of the threat” from organised crime networks, which are currently taking advantage of law enforcement’s traditional geographical boundaries, siloed working, and legacy technology and structures more suited to a “bygone age”, as Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons reports.

OPINION: More than 1,600 people lost their lives on British roads last year, with distraction, poor driver behaviour and under-resourced roads policing all contributing to the stabilisation of previously declining casualty figures, says Drivetech Director Leo Taylor, who is calling for a government-led ‘coalition of the willing’– properly resourced and taking advantage of new technology – to reduce the number of people killed and seriously injured on the roads.

FEATURE: A recent paper published as part of collection of insights by the EU Knowledge Hub on Prevention of Radicalisation highlights the role played by social media and digital networks and algorithms in creating a landscape of online extremist antisemitism; Policing Insight’s Andrew Staniforth looks at the risks to both Jewish communities and wider democracy set out in the paper, as well as efforts to counter the digital dangers.

ADVERTISEMENT FEATURE: Fraud is rising fast in the UK, fuelled by scams and schemes that thrive on social media. In this article, Fivecast’s David Janson examines why investigators need AI-powered open-source intelligence to uncover hidden networks and stay ahead of increasingly organised criminals.

FEATURE: A College of Policing evaluation of the use of a video first response (VFR) approach to non-emergency domestic abuse calls has found that VFR can significantly reduce response times for victims, while also improving victim safeguarding and perceptions of being believed by officers – but there’s little evidence so far to suggest an increase in positive criminal justice outcomes, as Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons reports.

INTERVIEW: Merging four separate police functions under one banner, the new National Centre for Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) and Public Protection is part of a UK Government drive to start “treating the epidemic of violence against women and children with the seriousness it deserves”; Policing Insight’s Ian Weinfass spoke to the Centre’s Deputy Director, Assistant Chief Constable Claire Bell, about how it is working so far and what the future holds.

OPINION: The Australia New Zealand Policing Advisory Agency (ANZPAA) recently published its revised Anti-Racism and Cultural Diversity Principles, designed to provide a framework for police “to address racism and strengthen collaborative partnerships”; Jacqueline Durand, ANZPAA’s Assistant Director of Policy and Projects, explains why the Principles have been updated, the important differences between anti-racism and cultural awareness, and the vital role leadership plays in delivering this proactive approach.

INTERVIEW: The UK’s Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) recently published new guidance for police forces and other uniformed services on collecting and analysing equality data; EHRC Wales Committee Interim Chair Martyn Jones spoke to Policing Insight’s Keith Potter about the drivers behind the new guidance, how good data could lead to necessary cultural change, and why police forces need to be aware of their statutory duties around collating and utilising equality data.

OPINION: The recent undercover BBC Panorama programme highlighting serious misconduct by some Met officers, and the resulting outcry, once again focused on the bad behaviour of individuals; but Graham Goulden, a former officer with a 30-year career and now a strong advocate for safe and supportive workplaces, argues that the real focus needs to be on the cultures, situations and systems that enable such behaviour.