Current advanced technology has been an excellent deal for contemporary law enforcement agencies. Over the last few decades story of internet access has spread explosively. Technologies like social media and internet applications have highly contributed.
However, it has negatively added to gangs and terrorist ways of performing their plans. For example, Waze, a mobile app, assists them to track the location of officers thus avoiding harm law enforcement personnel.
With whatever internet they may use, criminals often leave a trail behind. Having high technology tools, law enforcement technicians can partly use it against crime offenders.
The internet is currently a vast web of sharing personal information permissible as evidence when attained legally. It has created an organic database of recorded behaviors which is used to provide a unique insight in whichever case.
The provided data can also be useful in identifying crime patterns and threat anticipation. This rapid expansion of technology has led to the innovation of improved tools which is helping officers to serve the community.
The law agencies have known the principal value of such tools thus meeting the shifting demands of police work. All of them, whether untested or controversial, has the potential of altering the operation of law enforcement. These techs include:
Facial recognition software systems
There was once a real issue raised by Amazon shareholders. It was a concern that the government would misuse facial data to track innocent people.
It was then seen that such data holds a maximum 80% confidence threshold which is not accurate to identify an individual. However, law agencies are still using this system to combat crime. It will remain as the primary tool used and adopted by law enforcement agencies.
Use of drones
This machine is widely accepted in police departments. It is meant to enhance and ensure safety in public agencies along with the nation. For example, it is used as a correction facility to combat contraband being smuggled into prisons.
Police robots
This kind of technology is already in use today. These robots are usually used to defuse bombs or deescalate situations without police officers being endangered. They have been invented and innovated in a wide variety ranging in sizes and purposes. However, they are expensive in a way making it difficult to be adopted in every agency.
Body cameras
Most of the police officers in their departments are currently adopting body camera technologies. They are of importance whenever officers have a line of defense where their actions are under review. Due to advanced technology, a step further of equipping police dogs with cameras that transmit live videos has been adopted. It’s also known as K-9. It is capable of approaching a scene before an officer. Then, the recorded video footage helps an officer to determine if it’s safe to proceed with an operation. These cameras are also expensive complicating this decision for any police department.
Prediction algorithms
This has been a recent development in the field of the criminal justice system. It sorts an individual’s data to evaluate personal risk score. It considers age, prior criminal history, and employment status. The system speeds up this process by reducing human error allowing machines to categorize the risk of recidivism.
However, not all these technologies in law enforcement are accepted in all communities. Shortly, these tools and more advanced techniques will be adopted. There are a lot of potential growth and developments.
