In a relatively short period of time society has become increasingly digitized. The emergence and widespread use of computers, the internet, mobile devices and telecommunication infrastructure, social media, artificial intelligence (AI), and related technologies are having significant effects on various aspects of most people’s daily lives—the way they work, how they communicate, and the way they recreate. People have access to an abundance of data from social media, data from websites that can be found via search engines, and geospatial data like that used in maps and route planners. 

Beyond available “societal data,” the police are also generating a lot of data as an inherent part of their day-to-day operations. Besides the still mostly manual entries into records management systems, case management systems, and other administrative systems the police use, new technologies are increasingly being deployed that produce data, such as track-and-trace systems, smart CCTV, body-worn cameras, drones, and so forth. The increasing digitization and simultaneous explosion of data, commonly known as “big data,” are strongly impacting police work and shaping operational, tactical, and strategic processes. In their day-to-day operations, like patrolling, police agencies are progressively using technologies and digital applications that allow them to access and share data and information. One common example are smartphones that provide individual police officers with direct access to police systems and databases.

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