Artificial Intelligence

OPINION: As the Data (Use and Access) Bill makes its way through the UK Parliament, Canterbury Christ Church University Senior Lecturer in Policing, Dr David Lydon, looks at the potential implications of the new legislation on the use of automated decision-making in policing, and the opportunities and challenges it could present for police forces as well as the need to ensure safeguards for the public.

FEATURE: A new CCTV system introduced by Cumbria Constabulary, which uses artificial intelligence analytics to search both stored and real-time footage to identify missing persons and suspect individuals and vehicles, is saving the force thousands of hours as well as improving outcomes, and could soon be accessible to officers out on patrol via mobile phones and laptops, as Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons reports.

OPINION: In response to the call for a new national Police Agency as set out in the recent ‘Fit for the Future’ paper published jointly by the Police Foundation and Leapwise Advisory, Canterbury Christ Church University Senior Lecturer in Policing, Dr David Lydon, suggests that, rather than pushing for greater centralisation, the cornerstone for effective police reform should be agility, inclusivity, and technological innovation.

FEATURE: A report from the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change warns that UK’s current policing model is “fundamentally ill-suited” to tackling the huge threat of serious and organised crime, and urges the Government to establish a single UK-wide police force to lead on all crimes and threats that cross force boundaries, as Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons reports.

ANALYSIS: In the last in a series of five articles looking at the big debates in police use of facial recognition (FR), extracted from this year’s ‘Facing the future: The rise of facial recognition in policing’ report, Policing Insight’s James Sweetland explores the remarkable global variations in the legal and regulatory frameworks governing FR use, and whether a more effective approach can balance the obvious risks against the potential benefits to secure the best possible outcomes for public safety.

FEATURE: A 27-year-old paedophile was creating cartoonish pseudo child abuse images and distributing them among an online network; Detective Chief Inspector Jen Tattersall from Greater Manchester Police’s online child abuse investigations team tells Ian Weinfass how the force managed to bring a case against the offender, and safeguard real children at risk.

FEATURE: At this year’s APCC-NPCC Partnership Summit, where science and tech issues were once again high on the agenda, City of London Police Commissioner Pete O’Doherty argued for policing to become more offensive in its efforts to ensure cyber security; senior leaders also made the case for a stronger national approach to tech, and a survivor of deepfake abuse described how the police response to her crime left her “completely broken”, as Policing Insight’s James Sweetland reports.

INNOVATION: There is much debate about the increasing use of artificial intelligence (AI) in surveillance (both in policing and other sectors), and the public’s response to that deployment; researcher, lecturer, and Sheffield Hallam University PhD candidate Yasmine Ezzeddine argues that latest research suggests the public are already adapting to the growing use of AI – and rather than saying “no”, are urging for “not so fast”.

INNOVATION: Tobias Stenström, Head of Camera Surveillance, Unmanned Aircraft Systems and Analytics for the Swedish Police Authority’s West Region, believes that data-driven policing “requires a different type of leadership” that “might be out of many bosses’ comfort zones”; speaking at a recent conference he also revealed how Swedish police are exploiting AI tools like ChatGPT and object recognition tech, as Policing Insight’s James Sweetland reports.

FEATURE: Academics from two Canadian universities have raised concerns about the country’s law enforcement use of artificial intelligence (AI) tools, claiming that police bodies aren’t transparent enough when procuring new tech, and that failing to make policing subject to new AI legislation could undermine justice in Canada in the future, as Policing Insight’s James Sweetland reports.

INNOVATION: Many police forces around the world are facing new and ever-changing challenges – both in the ‘real world’ and online – and efforts to implement community policing approaches face an increasingly complex landscape; Policing Insight’s Andrew Staniforth looks at a new European Commission initiative to help police and other agencies meet those challenges, leveraging social sciences methodologies as well as the latest technology.

ANALYSIS: In the third in a series of five articles looking at the big debates in police use of facial recognition (FR), extracted from this year’s ‘Facing the future: The rise of facial recognition in policing’ report, Policing Insight’s James Sweetland explored human involvement in overseeing FR systems – often seen as an essential requirement for a trustworthy use of the technology, but does the human presence really reduce bias?

ADVERTISEMENT FEATURE: With an unprecedented focus on Artificial Intelligence and its positive use in supporting policing operations and increasing productivity, it is vital to ensure that the potential is combined with human expertise in order to tackle society’s challenges and win public trust. This latest Guide provides an insight into how the ethical use of AI can help inform decision-making and enhance public safety.

INTERVIEW: Estonia’s Police and Border Guard Board face a unique set of challenges, protecting its communities and securing a border that is also the external border of the European Union; Policing Insight’s Andrew Staniforth spoke to Hannes Järvine, Strategy Bureau Project Manager in the Board’s Development Department, about the responsibilities of keeping Estonian citizens safe and borders secure, and how collaborative research and innovation are helping to enhance the service’s operational capabilities.

INNOVATION: Immersive technologies such as virtual and augmented reality are increasingly important in society, as well as transforming how police forces train, adapt, and respond to challenges; Wrexham University Professional Policing Lecturer Darren Jacks – a former police officer with 30 years of experience – believes higher education institutions have a vital role to play in partnering with police to leverage the maximum benefits from these new technologies.

FEATURE: Speaking at an international workshop hosted by the University of Gothenburg and CRISP, Research Fellow Amir Cahane of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem warned that Israel Police engage in “a disturbing pattern of acquire first and ask questions later” when deploying domestic AI surveillance tools – with “a lack of legal constraints” meaning that court battles over individual cases play an outsized role, as Policing Insight’s James Sweetland reports.

INNOVATION: With artificial intelligence (AI) advances hailed widely as a huge opportunity for law enforcement, police now face the challenge of identifying effective AI systems from those that don’t do the job; University of Cambridge PhD candidate Jacob John Verrey, and Chief Inspector Lewis Lincoln-Gordon of the National Police Chiefs’ Council AI Portfolio, argue that adapting and implementing the ‘snake oil filter’ approach used in medicine could offer policing an efficient process for assessing and deploying the right technology.

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ANALYSIS: In the second in a series of five articles looking at the big debates in police use of facial recognition (FR) – extracted from this year’s ‘Facing the future: The rise of facial recognition in policing’ report – Policing Insight spoke to senior officers, academics and technical experts to explore concerns around bias and accuracy, a subject central to the facial recognition debate and a common reason for some people’s opposition to police use of this technology.

INNOVATION: In the latest in a series of articles exploring the opportunities and challenges presented to police by the rapid growth of artificial intelligence (AI), Chief Philip Lukens compares and contrasts the use of AI drones as patrol tools and first responders with the traditional role of patrol cars, and explores the key issues around privacy, accountability and oversight.

INNOVATION: Social media contacts with police forces soared during the disorder in England and Northern Ireland in the summer of 2024; Policing Insight’s Ian Weinfass looks at the role digi desks played during the crisis, and examines how useful they are for day-to-day operations.

ANALYSIS: In the second of two articles on the community intelligence-led policing methodology (CILPM), Steve Dodd, a former South Wales Police detective and College of Policing subject matter expert on intelligence professionalisation, looks at how CILPM can help to tackle some of the existing key policing challenges, and why the current focus on community and neighbourhood policing make it the ideal time to adopt the new methodology.

FEATURE: A new report from Europol sets out how artificial intelligence (AI) could “significantly transform policing”, with tools such as generative AI offering a “treasure trove of possibilities” for law enforcement; but the report also highlights the profound risks around AI systems embedding “longstanding societal biases”, and the important restrictions coming into force via the landmark EU AI Act passed earlier this year, as Policing Insight’s James Sweetland reports. 

INTERVIEW: As the new Director General of the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC), ex-Home Office official Rachel Watson is heading up a body that’s constantly in the headlines; in an interview with Policing Insight’s James Sweetland, she explained the IOPC’s aim to be “really radical in speeding up parts of its investigations”, why a funding boost’s needed to mitigate a 34% real-terms budget cut, and why it’s “healthy” that the watchdog “won’t always agree with policing”.