THE POLICE DATA CHALLENGE Copyright Policing Insight/Cognyte 2023 around our people and our structures, because we will benefit at far greater scale from AI in the long term if we get it right in the short term. “If we rush to try and get policing onto the AI bandwagon too quickly, we’ll probably lose more ground than we gain in the long term; it’s the boring stuff, but it’s so incredibly important that we get it right.” He believes that investing now in robotic process automation “to improve data quality” and work on the “structure and integrity of that data and our systems” could be an “enormous accelerator” in building the bedrock for the introduction of AI: “Although robotic process automation isn’t in itself really AI, it’s an important precursor towards what I consider to be transformative in policing.” Speed and accuracy Dylan is certainly far from alone in his enthusiasm for the potential of AI in policing, and in collating, extracting and analysing data in particular. Paul Williamson, a former Regional Head of Investigations for the NCA and now Programme Leader for Policing at the University of the West of England (UK), can see huge advantages in terms of the speed and accuracy offered by the new technology. “Artificial intelligence and machine learning is going to be rapid, so our ability to analyse large amounts of data – which we did on Operation Venetic – will become a lot more common and will advance very, very quickly. “That includes video footage, social media posts, and identifying patterns and anomalies that can be relevant to a criminal investigation; I think all of that is going to be more rapid.” Indeed, AI is not just viewed as a ‘nice to have’, but is seen by many – including NPCC National Intelligence Portfolio Lead, Chief Constable Lisa Winward, and former West Midlands Chief Constable Sir David Thompson – as an essential policing tool. “Just the sheer volume and breadth of data out there, we need technology to be part of the solution to this,” CC Winward told Policing Insight. “It doesn’t matter how skilled your workforce are, we’ll need to use modern technology and some form of artificial intelligence to decipher that level of information into something that is manageable and meaningful, and be able to join the dots up.” Sir David, previously the UK lead for developing the National Common Intelligence Application, is equally adamant about the importance of new technology: “I think the threat North Yorkshire Chief Constable Lisa Winward, the National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC) Intelligence Portfolio Lead “It doesn’t matter how skilled your workforce are, we’ll need to use modern technology and some form of artificial intelligence to decipher that level of information into something that is manageable and meaningful, and be able to join the dots up.” CC Lisa Winward NPCC National Intelligence Lead