INSIGHT: The globalisation of mass communication and the permeation of the internet into almost all aspects of society has further enabled serious societal threats to exploit and target citizens, businesses and, through the emergence of online terrorism, democratic ideals. Professor Babak Akhgar FBCS, Director of CENTRIC (Centre of Excellence in Terrorism, Resilience, Intelligence & Organised Crime Research) highlights the challenges and introduces a new multi-disciplinary research and innovation project which seeks to address them.

Opinion: Hoax calls are the bane of the emergency services. One force alone received 1,333 such calls in 2017, but how do you stop callers wasting precious police time and resources? Kathryn Jeffrey of APD Communications offers a solution to the problem.

FREE ACCESS: Policing Insight welcomes officers and staff from Cleveland Police, who now have FREE access to Policing Insight with the start of a new organisation wide subscription. Policing Insight is now available FREE to officers and staff in many UK forces and in other police and criminal justice organisations - read on to find out how to use your FREE subscriber access.

NEWS: Bernard Rix, CoPaCC Chief Executive, invites every OPCC to participate in this year's review of PCC and OPCC transparency

OPINION: Allan Fairley, UK Police & Justice Managing Director for Accenture, works with a range of public sector, police and justice clients. In his latest article, Allan provides his thoughts on how robotics and automation can help officers and staff have more time for engaging with their communities.

OPINION: The first of a new series of articles providing a platform for police and crime commissioners (PCCs) to look back on the first half of their current term, highlighting their achievements so far and ambitions for the remainder of their term. We start with the thoughts of Lord Willy Bach, the PCC for Leicestershire

NEWS: John Apter, former Chair of Hampshire Police Federation, has been confirmed as the first National Chair to be voted in by police officers up and down the country.

ANALYSIS: The publication of the latest crime statistics generated intense media scrutiny of police performance, with headlines focused on poor detection rates or outcomes. Former Greater Manchester Police ACC and regular Policing Insight contributor Ian Wiggett looks at the challenge of measuring how good the police are at detecting crime.

INSIGHT: Artificial intelligence (AI) is already being used by investigators but its role in policing is poorly understood, both inside the community and in society at large. Clare Elford Managing Director of Clue, sheds some light on this increasingly important tool

Analysis: In 2012, there were nearly 62,000 scrap metal thefts in the UK. By 2016, this had fallen to around 16,000. Research economist with the London School of Economics Professor Tom Kirchmaier examines how a combination of policing, legislation changes and global commodity prices impacted the crime.

Opinion: Does the word feedback make you shudder? In our series on improving performance in the workplace, Jonathan Rees, owner of Momoho and and an expert in developing high-performing teams in the bluelight sector, shows how the process can be a positive experience.

ANALYSIS: Report Watch summarises the main findings of reports that impact on policing and includes responses from the main stakeholders as well as media reaction. Here we take a look at the Independent Office for Police Conduct (formerly the IPCC) annual report on deaths in and following police custody.

Police Governance Summit 2018: At this year’s Police Governance Summit 2018, Humberside OPCC Chief Executive Rachel Cook explored the role of leadership in ensuring OPCCs attract and retain the right people to influence success. The following is an abridged version of her presentation.

Q&A: Analytical and data processing software firm Forensic Analytics is the latest company to collaborate with The Police ICT Company, having recently been recognised on its Vendor Management Programme. Forensic Analytics Managing Director and co-founder Joe Hoy  gives his insight into the challenges facing policing in this space and how the collaboration with The Police ICT Company has simplified the procurement process.

Analysis: UK policing shares many of the same challenges as their colleagues around the world. In its report - Policing in a Networked World, PwC analysed six countries: Australia, Canada, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden and the United Kingdom to identify the key challenges that the police are facing, and how police organisations are responding to those challenges. The following is an abridged version of the report.

ANALYSIS: Report Watch summarises the main findings of reports that impact on policing and includes responses from the main stakeholders as well as media reaction. Here we take a look at HMICFRS' fourth inspection of the National Crime Agency which, overall, finds an effective and efficient service, whilst highlighting areas for improvement.

IN THE NEWS: This summary curates the key policing-related research that's been published online in the last week, with links to the original journal articles, and selected abstracts - plus a short guide outlining how serving police officers and staff can get access, free, to many of the articles listed through the National Police Library.

Long Read: In the second of our three-part series on cyber crime and its effects on  UK policing, CEO and co-founder of Cyber Security Intelligence Alfred Rolington offers a detailed insight into the current cyber crime landscape and how UK policing is managing the threat.

ANALYSIS: The scale of the challenge involved in protecting the UK's borders is unprecedented. Professor Babak Akhgar of Sheffield Hallam University explains how the work of Project ROBORDER - testing innovative surveillance technologies - could help border security address emerging threats.

Police Governance Summit 2018: At this year’s Police Governance Summit 2018, Kathie Cashell, Director of Strategy and Impact for the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) discussed the newly-established IOPC and the implications for police governance. Policing Insight reports on her presentation.

Opinion: Next year, the new Office for Communications Data Authorisations (OCDA) goes live. Interim CEO Shainila Pradhan explains the changes and the organisation's ambition to offer law enforcement a world class service.

ANALYSIS: In late 2015, coercive control became a criminal offence in England and Wales, but the number of convictions have been low. Now a team at Lancaster University led by Dr Charlotte Barlow have developed a new tool to help train police officers to help victims of the new offence.

POLICE ICT USER SURVEY: Two weeks left to go for UK police officers and staff to share their views and experiences of ICT provision in their force by taking part in the National Police ICT User Survey - a huge opportunity to help police decision makers and the supplier community improve the provision of ICT.

IN THE NEWS: This summary curates the key policing-related research that's been published online in the last week, with links to the original journal articles, and selected abstracts - plus a short guide outlining how serving police officers and staff can get access, free, to many of the articles listed through the National Police Library.