Building trust in digital policing: A scoping review of community policing apps

TL;DR

This paper reviews 240 digital policing apps to evaluate how they foster trust and meet community needs, highlighting design features that influence public perception and cooperation.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive scoping review of existing community policing apps and proposes 12 design considerations for improving trust and effectiveness.

Findings

Most apps require registration or login.

Over half allow anonymous reporting.

Few apps have clear privacy policies.

Abstract

Perceptions of police trustworthiness are linked to citizens' willingness to cooperate with police. Trust can be fostered by introducing accountability mechanisms, or by increasing a shared police/citizen identity, both which can be achieved digitally. Digital mechanisms can also be designed to safeguard, engage, reassure, inform, and empower diverse communities. We systematically scoped 240 existing online citizen-police and relevant third-party communication apps, to examine whether they sought to meet community needs and policing visions. We found that 82% required registration or login details, 55% of those with a reporting mechanism allowed for anonymous reporting, and 10% provided an understandable privacy policy. Police apps were more likely to seek to reassure, safeguard and inform users, while third-party apps were more likely to seek to empower users. As poorly designed apps risk amplifying mistrust and undermining policing efforts, we suggest 12 design considerations to help ensure the development of high quality/fit for purpose Police/Citizen apps.