Technology/equipment/services

ADVERTISEMENT FEATURE: Digital evidence is growing by leaps and bounds, especially with the roll out of new body worn camera systems. But this evidence is not always easily accessible. To address the challenges of managing digital evidence, Lancashire Constabulary adopted a new approach. The force leverages NICE Investigate to make digital evidence from multiple connected systems, including body worn video, readily accessible to officers through a single login and to speed up Lancashire's ability to share video with the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS).

ADVERTISEMENT FEATURE: Front-line police deserve to be protected by equipment that not only protects them, but the public too. TASER technology is one of the most studied, safe and effective means of quickly stopping a threat. In this article, we’ll dig into the research around TASER energy devices and address misconceptions and myths.

END OF YEAR REVIEW: As 2022 draws to a close, Policing Insight Editor Keith Potter looks back over some of the key law enforcement themes covered over the past 12 months, the challenges met and opportunities offered, and our continuing commitment to provide a platform for sharing expertise, understanding and best practice throughout 2023.

INNOVATION: Recent commercial research in the US has highlighted the key role that technology could play in increasing public trust in policing; Kinana Hussain, Vice President of Product Management at Digi International, explains how connectivity solutions can keep law enforcement and first responders safe while increasing trust in the communities they serve.

ADVERTISEMENT FEATURE: The complexity of policing challenges is ever-evolving. In this article, we discuss how we made strides, with your feedback, to strengthen the Axon ecosystem in 2022 to help solve pain points and offer better support for positive policing outcomes.

OPINION: Law enforcement agencies around the world often rely heavily on eyewitness testimony, but unreliable eyewitness evidence is often a contributing factor in miscarriages of justice; Dr Michel Funicelli a Lecturer in Police Studies at Teesside University and a 33-year veteran of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, believes new technology analysing brainwaves could be a significant asset for policing in assessing the credibility of witnesses.

ADVERTISEMENT FEATURE: Ensuring a safe community and supporting victims of crimes are core missions of Merseyside Police. But as digital evidence continued to grow, Merseyside Police’s investigative resources were stretched to the limit. The force found a solution to all of these challenges in NICE Investigate. NICE Investigate collapses Merseyside’s digital evidence silos into a single login, so investigators can do all of their work in one place, and it eliminates long wait times for evidence. Now, cases can be resolved successfully and sooner.

ADVERTISEMENT FEATURE: London’s Metropolitan Police Service now shares 600% more digital evidence with the CPS than in initial rollout. Learn how Axon Evidence helps facilitate efficient sharing for faster investigations.

ANALYSIS: Police adoption of live facial recognition (LFR) is a controversial topic, with the profound opportunities offered by this technology balanced out by considerable risks. A recent report from Cambridge University’s Minderoo Centre for Technology and Democracy presents a highly critical view of how the police use LFR. In this article, Policing Insight’s James Sweetland presents both sides of the story.

INNOVATION: As forces across England and Wales strive to hit ambitious recruitment targets, they also face the challenge of new recruits now outnumbering more experienced officers’ Paul Roberts, Head of Product Strategy and Innovation, Public Safety at NEC Software Solutions; believes new technology such as artificial intelligence, machine learning and advanced analytics could play a vital role in upskilling new recruits as quickly as possible.

ADVERTISEMENT FEATURE: Registration has opened for the 2023 annual British APCO Conference and Exhibition, which is the leading public safety communications technology event in the UK and supported by Policing Insight as media partner.

ADVERTISMENT FEATURE: The Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) oversees the police complaints system in England and Wales. They investigate the most serious matters, including deaths following police contact, and set the standards by which the police should handle complaints. The IOPC wanted to make it as easy and seamless as possible for police forces to share information and evidence with IOPC investigators. To address this and other challenges, the IOPC implemented NICE Investigate.

ANALYSIS: The rapid development of artificial intelligence (AI) is likely to bring significant changes to policing tools and techniques; Dr Jonathan Jackson and Ronald Winch of Birmingham City University argue that, as legislation lags behind the pace of technological development across society, policing needs to urgently develop and implement ethical and safe systems of governance to protect the model of policing by consent.

ADVERTISEMENT FEATURE: In August 2021 HM Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire and Rescue Services (HMICFRS), the College of Policing and the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) published a report in response to the super-complaint submitted by the Centre for Women’s Justice on the police use of protective measures in cases involving violence against women and girls (VAWG). Razi Hassan of the Domestic Abuse Alliance reviews the recommendations set out in the report and explains how the WEPROTECT instant victim referral service accelerates access to legal assistance and intervention.

OPINION: The ever-complex nature of policing continues to highlight the need for sharing and analysing data, with interoperability crucial to successful technological development; Sebastian Uhlig, Managing Consultant of Informed Solutions, explores the key ingredients required to ensure that digital transformation is accelerated and de-risked to improve the working lives of police officers, and enhance their service to the public.

ANALYSIS: This month’s ANZPAA Conference offered another opportunity to learn more about brain fingerprinting, and the potential for its use in law enforcement investigations and deception detection; Policing Insight’s Andrew Staniforth looks at the background to this cutting-edge technology, research on its operational performance to date, and how it could benefit policing and criminal justice systems moving forwards.

ADVERTISEMENT FEATURE: Policing performance has never been under the microscope as much as it is now. There are some police forces that have been placed under special measures by His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabularies and Fire and Rescue Services (HMICFRS). In reviewing these findings, we can identify common themes in each of the areas in which policing is still considered to be underperforming.

ADVERTISEMENT FEATURE: Recent studies of the use and impact of, for example, body-worn video (BWV) cameras, have produced inconclusive results, or the reporting is strictly quantitative – all about statistics and numbers, and less about the human experience of officers and the public. So we at Axon supported an independent study by Crest Advisory, a leading consultancy in the UK policing, justice and public safety sectors, to assess the impact of enabling technologies on Cumbria’s constabulary.

ADVERTISEMENT FEATURE: Integration and data are at the very core of Police work, ensuring information is accessible by the right people at the right time through the most appropriate channel. In this article we will discuss how Forces can unlock the power of their data to deliver key policing outcomes.

ADVERTISEMENT FEATURE: Policing is changing, and nearly every job now has a digital element attached to it. Like most police forces around the world, Nottinghamshire Police is experiencing a massive increase in digital evidence. To provide the best possible service to victims of crime, as well as businesses and communities, Nottinghamshire needed a better way to manage it. NICE Investigate is helping Nottinghamshire modernise its approach, to reduce the risk to victims and become a more efficient and agile force.

INNOVATION: From sexual abuse to modern slavery and county lines, tackling child exploitation is a complex challenge, and one where information sharing, identification and intervention are crucial; Dr Hayley Watson and Stephen Anning of Trilateral Research explain how a new ethical artificial intelligence (AI) platform developed in collaboration with Lincolnshire Police is analysing big data to provide early indicators of those children most vulnerable to potential exploitation.

ADVERTISEMENT FEATURE: What should your force expect from a digital evidence management system? Learn how evolving digital evidence management can tame the tidal wave of data and future-proof your organisation.

INTERVIEW: The Straits of Gibraltar are a potential illicit gateway between Europe and Africa, but it’s not just drugs and people smugglers keeping the Royal Gibraltar Police Marine Unit busy; in this second in a two-part series on the Unit’s work, Policing Insight’s Martin Buhagiar spoke to Chief Inspector Sean Perera about the unique challenges of policing the Iberian Peninsula and this incredibly busy stretch of water, where tackling traffickers, counter-terrorism and environmental emergencies are all part of the job.

ANALYSIS: Teaching methods are constantly evolving, driven in part by the emergence of new technology, and virtual reality (VR) is one of the latest learning tools; Claire Smith, a former police officer and now a Teaching Fellow at the University of Portsmouth, outlines the findings of a recent pilot study into how VR could be used to improve learning for the UK’s new student officers.