EU COMPOSITE

ICT Trends in European Policing

In this report we present the results from interviews and document analyses of current and planned information and communication technology (ICT) projects with police forces from 10 European countries and from interviews with technology vendors in the field of ICT for policing. Based on a cross-country, cross-organisational analysis, we present the following themes that describe major trends in ICT for European policing:

· the integration of intelligence data systems

· the adoption of mobile computing

· the use of video surveillance technologies

· the application of digital biometrics

· the crosscutting issue of user acceptance

· the emerging challenge of social media applications

We discuss how these issues are relevant and thereby point to open issues for future research. Recently, rapid developments in the field of ICT have had a major influence upon police work. Technological innovations turn out to change the organisational

environment in significant ways. For police, ICT plays a twofold role: New technologies can support police work but also provide new opportunities for offenders to commit crimes.

Within the COMPOSITE project, a European-wide research project aimed at investigating change within police forces, a dedicated work package ‘Technology Adaptation’ specifically focuses on change processes relating to ICT.

As a first step, the trend analysis presented in this report scans for current ICT developments and thereby provides pointers for future research.

Here you have the link to the EU-project