Why Britain’s police forces are taking to AI

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. HARRY SCHONE’s job is to work out how the police can use artificial intelligence. At Police Scotland’s headquarters, a glass cube in Glasgow’s East End, he has assembled a team of coders and engineers who stand out among strait-laced colleagues.

They are working on an array of schemes: a program that transcribes evidence; a model that helps shift-planners deploy officers; a tool that matches reported thefts with ads on resale websites. Across the rich world police forces are struggling. Many have had their funding cut.

In Britain sluggish response times, low clear-up rates and a series of scandals have left public confidence in policing near a record low: 51% of people think the cops are doing a good job, down from 75% in 2000. What if there were a silver bullet? Policing—perhaps more than any other public service—could be transformed by AI. Whether that opportunity will be grasped, however, is open to question.

Mr Plodding Policing is an old craft that has often resisted change. In the 20th century police chiefs opposed the introduction of motor cars (horses were just fine) and radios (officers would get lazy). In the 21st the rank-and-file resisted computers, preferring to write their case notes by hand.

But at its core policing is about intelligence, and involves processing vast troves of information. That makes it a good test case of AI. “People underestimate how much this could transform our service," says Superintendent Lewis Lincoln-Gordon of the National Police Chiefs’ Council.

Take transcription. Police Scotland employs 40 typists. Most forces still operate a typing pool to transcribe interviews and produce evidence for court.