Top 5 Reasons for Robust Digital Evidence Management Author: Tunde Williams

Without doubt, effective policing depends on efficient information management. Every year over a million evidential images could be generated by a mid-sized police force. These images are typically from myriad sources, including forensic teams, Closed Circuit Television cameras and increasingly, members of the public. Without the capability to organise the huge volumes of images being generated and to turn them into actionable intelligence, opportunities to reduce crime and protect communities can be missed. It is reasonable to assume that a significant proportion of the images collected for policing purposes might be deemed as containing personal information and would be the subject of legal safeguards relating to Data Protection and Human Rights – in particular the right of an individual to a fair trial and the right to respect for private and family life as described in Articles 6 and 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights. These legal safeguards include the need to develop full audit trails that document any editing and processing applied to an image; preventing unlawful disclosure of personal information; ensuring the disposal of personal information once it is no longer required for policing purposes. There are other requirements but this helps to highlight the administrative burden placed on police forces struggling with limited resources.There is some good news, though. In today’s tough fiscal environment, governments are looking for ways to reduce public spending and this has been a catalyst for new digital policing work practices. At the heart of this digital strategy are secure digital asset management (DAM) systems that will transform not just policing but also the criminal justice system.Here are 5 key benefits DAM systems are delivering:1. A robust audit trail for evidential imagesWhen it comes to crime prosecution, it is vital that the integrity of evidential images is protected right from the point of capture. The documentation of audit trails for police images, however, creates a back office burden that potentially negates their crime-fighting benefits. By automating the process of auditing each officer’s interaction with a digital asset, DAMs are helping to eliminate much of the administrative overhead.2. Reduced risk of media obsolescenceWrite Once Read Many Times (WORM) CDs are popular among police forces as a means to store master images. By some estimates, these WORM CDs are expected to last a maximum of 25 years under ideal conditions. However, with repeated rewrites, the aluminium reflective layer starts to erode after a while, a phenomenon known as disk rot. The longevity of storage media is a key concern for police forces especially when you consider the time periods for which certain images must be retained. In many countries, for example, there is a requirement for unresolved missing persons images to be retained indefinitely.If you had missing persons images on WORM CDs, how could you be sure that in, say 10 years time, there will be replay hardware available for viewing the contents? Current trends point to a change in the common media of choice roughly every 12 years. Due to these concerns, data held on WORM media will need to be migrated onto newer media and transcoded to a format that is more accessible.With a DAM solution, images are held in a secure central repository with suitable levels of backup and when properly managed, the task of migrating data onto new media and new formats is less problematic.3. Evidence storage costs kept under controlThe increasing volumes of digital assets being generated by police forces will serve to accelerate the migration from CDs to alternative and more cost effective storage media. A mid-size police force for example, could end up using tens of thousands of CD-ROMs for archiving digital images – a costly method for archiving digital assets, especially given the increasing use of video evidence. Wider use of digital cameras and other data devices across the force, and amongst the general public, has increased the volume of digital images.As the proportion of images with long legal retention periods increases, more storage capacity will be required. Let’s take for example a force that wants to deploy 50 body-worn cameras to a neighbourhood patrol team. Let’s say the body-worn cameras record at a resolution of 720 x 576 pixels and a frame rate of 25 fps. Let’s also assume that body-worn video must be retained for 31 days before being overwritten. If you do the sums, that means you would need to provide 28 Terabytes – that’s a lot of storage! The situation is exacerbated by the need to also retain digital information with longer retention periods. If you had to store images of missing persons, your police force would be obliged to retain the image up until at least 6 years after the case had been resolved.DAMs provide the centralised scalability you need for cost effective storage of short and longer term digital assets. By leveraging a client server architecture and IP technology, DAMs can offer multiple storage options: from a locally managed DAM system to a fully cloud-based solution for reduced capital expense.4. Collaboration enhanced through efficient information sharingBy embracing international data standards such as ANSI/NISO Z39.50 which is used to standardise information retrieval, DAM systems can help to streamline collaboration and information sharing. It means that police officers can digitally transfer case information to prosecution lawyers, helping to reduce the time for case preparation. It also provides a secure platform for sharing intelligence with other forces to improve collaboration in the fight to reduce crime.The enhanced information sharing provided by the DAM means that frontline officers can use their mobile devices or TETRA radios to gain real-time access to intelligence. This creates the possibility of officers starting to build digital case files from the street and significantly increase the efficiency of the criminal justice system – especially for low-level volume crime that tends to clog up the system which is generally handled by front line officers.5. Faster searching and retrieval of digital imagesBy archiving images in a common format, the task of sharing intelligence across the force is made much easier, ensuring that the full value of digital imagery can be realised. A recent case in the UK, highlights the consequences of inefficient information management. A pair of raiders were caught in the act of burgling a public house. Unfortunately, vital evidence including crime scene photographs captured by police officers, was lost by Crown Prosecution Service lawyers. That case was lost with the suspects reportedly laughing at the victims as they walked free from court.There are countless examples of where better information management would have prevented a crime. By ensuring that the right information gets to the right person at the right time, DAMs provide police forces with a tool that not only helps in reducing crime but also in helping to eliminate paperwork and to streamline the prosecution process.With the Photograph and Intelligence Communication System and MTP6000 Series TETRA radio, Motorola Solutions is building a solution portfolio to help drive digital working into front line policing for enhanced public safety.Tunde Williams is in Global Product and Solutions Marketing for TETRA.Tunde is on LinkedIn at uk.linkedin.com/pub/olatunde-williams/5/282/67a/ Follow #SaferSmarterFaster on Twitter.Join the Motorola Solutions Community EMEA at http://www.linkedin.com/groups/Motorola-Solutions-Community-6519590/about