Re-territorialising the policing of cybercrime in the post-COVID-19 era:towards a new vision of local democratic cyber policing

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to develop the theorisation of cybercrime in the context of the pandemic, and to sketch out a vision of how law enforcement might respond to a transformed landscape of online crime and offending.Design/methodology/approach: This conceptual paper draws on empirical evidence from a range of sources (including official statistics) and the existing research literature, and revisits routine activities theory to illuminate the way that cybercrime patterns are being transformed by the pandemic.Findings: The pandemic is reshaping the routine activities of societies en masse, leading to changes in the ecology of risk and opportunity for cybercrime. There is evidence of a large increase in the prevalence of cybercrime as a result, yet much of this has a paradoxically “local” character.Practical implications: The authors identify specific practical implications for law enforcement, namely, that the role of local police in policing cybercrime should be re-envisioned, with a democratic, community-oriented approach at its heart. Originality/value: The theoretical perspective outlined is a novel and critical development of a well-established framework, opening up new paths to the theorisation of cybercrime and cybercrime policing. The authors’ suggestions for practitioners have the potential for direct impact, both at the level of practice and in terms of broader imaginaries and organisation of police and policing.</p

Barriers to a Cyberaware Scotland

CYBERSECURITY poses particular challenges to policy, policing and the public. Despite recent shifts in policing and security strategies, online victimisation is a major and growing problem for the Scottish criminal justice system. This article seeks to situate these challenges in the context of historical changes in criminal justice strategies and to suggest why these may be less effective in the case of cybercrime

Barriers to a "cyberaware" Scotland?

CYBERSECURITY poses particular challenges to policy, policing and the public. Despite recent shifts in policing and security strategies, online victimisation is a major and growing problem for the Scottish criminal justice system. This article seeks to situate these challenges in the context of historical changes in criminal justice strategies and to suggest why these may be less effective in the case of cybercrime

ECR collective response:the future of criminology and the unsustainability of the status quo for ECRs

We were delighted to be asked to respond to Richard Spark’s paper. We are encouraged by the themes and issues highlighted, and feel passionately about many of the areas of future research identified in the piece. Indeed, many of the areas of scholarship (such as research with the Global South, practices and experiences of crime and punishment, violence in all its forms, crime and technology, socio-legal research, and political discourses around crime) are areas with which we – as a collective group of early career researchers (ECRs) – are currently engaged, often in collaboration with other ECRs within and outwith the United Kingdom. We commend both Prof. Sparks and the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) for this important and timely reflection on the direction and possible futures of criminology

Pluralised responses to policing the Pandemic: Analysing the emergence of informal order maintenance strategies, the changing ‘policing web’, and the impacts of COVID-19 in rural communities. A Report on Interim Findings

Acknowledging the differential impacts of COVID-19 on communities, this project examines how the policing of rural communities has been impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. We assessed the changing demands made of the police and other key organisations, agencies and groups supporting order maintenance in rural communities and how they adapted their roles. Taking a case study approach, the project examined the similarities and differences between two rural communities and their experiences of policing and being policed through the first year of COVID-19. We also considered the short- and medium-term impact of changes to order maintenance in rural communities and explored the longer-term implications concerning trust and confidence in these communities. We employed a qualitative methodology, comprising an analysis of social media, twenty-two individual semi-structured interviews with key strategic, tactical, and operational staff from statutory agencies such as Police Scotland, Local Authorities (including Council Officers and local Councillors), a National Park, Forestry and Land Scotland, and local voluntary groups. We also held focus groups with three Community Councils. The pseudonymised case-study areas encapsulate different ‘rurals’: ‘Craignorth’, represents remote-rural communities in the north of Scotland and ‘Glen Roy’ captures an accessible rural community in the central belt of Scotland. Findings developed from thematic analysis of the data showed that the COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated and magnified existing pre-pandemic problems, particularly around (a lack of) access to service provision. The centralisation of resources to ‘hub’ towns and cities has accentuated feelings that some rural communities have reduced services and feel increasingly neglected and peripheral in decision making around resourcing. As a result, in the early phases of the pandemic, some rural community organisations filled the gaps left by services that were either withdrawn or moved online. Being sensitive to the particularities of local rural contexts is an important part of understanding the overall response. Communities, other formal agencies (e.g., police, local authorities), and the third sector utilised and developed extant structures, local knowledge, and networks of collective efficacy to organise support which addressed the needs of specific communities. Those communities with strong existing networks therefore tended to have clearer response channels than those with less formally structured organising networks. Our findings also show that as the pandemic has progressed, the value placed on outdoor and rural areas has increased. People want to consume them more, which has affected the social and economic fabric of these areas and communities (e.g., housing has rapidly increased in value in many rural locations and local infrastructures are strained by increased tourist activity). Indeed, there are tensions between national and local decision making, and how to resource and support (re)imagined rural areas facing larger influxes of tourists and home buyers, especially with national decisions predicated on public health concerns and risks posed by COVID-19 having profound impacts on rural communities. While this might be accepted as we continue to progress through the pandemic-related crisis, consideration must be given about how to balance (competing) local and national policy and decision making, ensuring that rural communities are engaged and empowered in the process. Police Scotland also appears to be successfully treading careful lines between the enforcement and discretionary policing of emergency legislation, where trust and confidence in the organisation is at stake. Communities were broadly supportive of the approaches taken in the pandemic reflecting the findings of the Independent Advisory Group’s report to the Scottish Police Authority Board (2020, p. 8), which showed that there had been “increased levels of public support and approval of policing in Scotland”. This may have been, as a Scottish Centre for Criminal Justice study argues (McVie, 2021, p. 47) attributable in part “to the high levels of discretion in police use of the new powers during the pandemic, with strong emphasis on informal means of encouraging people to comply with the Regulations and rare use of enforcement.” However, this same report also found that enforcement using Fixed Penalty Notices had been “highest amongst those living in Scotland’s poorest neighbourhoods” reflecting “an additional degree of inequality in the way the pandemic was experienced amongst certain groups of people who live in communities that are already typified by poorer health, economic, educational and environmental outcomes” (2021, p.48). It is interesting, therefore, to reflect on the impact of policing in different rural communities. Our data also revealed some evidence in Craignorth of a disconnect between trust and confidence in the police in general and trust and confidence in policing throughout the pandemic (i.e., participants appeared to ‘frame’ policing in the pandemic as something distinct to policing in ‘normal’ times). This highlights the continued importance of addressing historical police-community challenges and raises further future-oriented questions about the longer-term impacts of trust and confidence in the police in the post-pandemic context. We hope this report will inform practitioners as they continue to respond to ever-changing demands concerning the broader health agenda and order-maintenance as the pandemic unfolds. We also hope that in the longer-term the project will inform the wider policy-agendas in several key areas such as service provision models in remote-rural Scottish communities, particularly with regards policing and mental health, as well as public access to the countryside. Whilst the study was undertaken in Scotland, our conclusions are relevant to the pluralised policing of rural communities further afield during the COVID-19 pandemic

Influence policing: Strategic communications, digital nudges, and behaviour change marketing in Scottish and UK preventative policing

Influence policing is an emerging phenomenon: the use of digital targeted ‘nudge’ communications campaigns by police forces and law enforcement agencies to directly achieve strategic policing outcomes. While scholarship, civil society, and journalism have focused on political influence and targeting (often by malicious actors), there has been next to no research on the use of these influence techniques and technologies by governments for preventative law enforcement. With grant funding from SIPR and support from The Scottish Centre for Crime and Justice Research (SCCJR), we have studied how this novel mode of police practice is developing through an in-depth study of Police Scotland’s strategic communications unit and a wider systematic overview of these campaigns across the UK

Influence government, platform power and the patchwork profile : exploring the appropriation of targeted advertising infrastructures for government behaviour change campaigns

The targeted digital advertising infrastructures on which the business models of the social media platform economy rest have been the subject of significant academic and political interest. In this paper, we explore and theorise the appropriation of these infrastructures — designed for commercial and political advertising — by the state. In the U.K., public sector bodies have begun to repurpose the surveillance and messaging capacities of these social media platforms, along with the influencer economy, to deliver targeted behaviour change campaigns to achieve public policy goals. We explore how frameworks of behavioural government have aligned with Internet platforms’ extensive infrastructures and the commercial ecologies of professionalised strategic marketing. We map the current extent of these practices in the U.K. through case studies and empirical research in Meta’s Ad Library dataset. Although the networks of power and discourse within the ad infrastructure are indeed acting to shape the capacities of the state to engage in online influence, public bodies are mobilising their own substantial material networks of power and data to re-appropriate them to their own ends. Partly as a result of attempts by Meta to restrict the targeting of protected characteristics, we observe state communications campaigns building up what we term patchwork profiles of minute behavioural, demographic, and location-based categories in order to construct and reach particular groups of subjects. However, rather than a clear vision of a ‘cybernetic society’ of reactive information control, we instead find a heterogeneous and piecemeal landscape of different modes of power

The first national subject benchmark statement for UK higher education in policing: the importance of effective partnership and collaboration

Purpose (limit 100 words) The Quality Assurance Agency (QAA) for Higher Education in the UK focuses on maintaining, enhancing and standardising the quality of higher education. Of significant impact are the development of subject benchmark statements (SBS) by the QAA, which describe the type and content of study along with the academic standards expected of graduates in specific disciplines. Prior to 2022, the QAA did not have a SBS to which higher education policing programmes could be directly aligned. Design/methodology/approach (limit 100 words) Over 12-months, a SBS advisory group with representatives from higher education across England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, The College of Policing, QAA, Police Federation of England and Wales, and policing, worked in partnership to harness their collective professional experience and knowledge to create the first UK SBS for policing. Post publication of the SBS, permission was sought and granted from both the College of Policing and QAA for members of the advisory group to reflect in an article on their experiences of collaborating and working in partnership to achieve the SBS. Findings (limit 100 words) There is great importance of creating a shared vision and mutual trust, developed through open facilitated discussions, with representatives championing their cause and developing a collaborative and partnership approach to completing the SBS. Practical implications (limit 100 words) A collaborative and partnership approach is essential in developing and recognising the academic discipline of policing. This necessarily requires the joint development of initiatives, one of which is the coming together of higher education institutions, PSRBs and practitioner groups to collaborate and design QAA benchmark statements. Originality/value (limit 100 words) The SBS for policing is the first across the UK. The authors experiences can be used to assist others in their developments of similar subject specific benchmarking or academic quality standards. Social implications (limit 100 words) The SBS advisory group has further driven forward the emergence of policing as a recognised academic discipline to benefit multiple stakeholders

The Holy Grail: A road map for unlocking the climate record stored within Mars' polar layered deposits

In its polar layered deposits (PLD), Mars possesses a record of its recent climate, analogous to terrestrial ice sheets containing climate records on Earth. Each PLD is greater than 2 ​km thick and contains thousands of layers, each containing information on the climatic and atmospheric state during its deposition, creating a climate archive. With detailed measurements of layer composition, it may be possible to extract age, accumulation rates, atmospheric conditions, and surface activity at the time of deposition, among other important parameters; gaining the information would allow us to “read” the climate record. Because Mars has fewer complicating factors than Earth (e.g. oceans, biology, and human-modified climate), the planet offers a unique opportunity to study the history of a terrestrial planet’s climate, which in turn can teach us about our own planet and the thousands of terrestrial exoplanets waiting to be discovered. During a two-part workshop, the Keck Institute for Space Studies (KISS) hosted 38 Mars scientists and engineers who focused on determining the measurements needed to extract the climate record contained in the PLD. The group converged on four fundamental questions that must be answered with the goal of interpreting the climate record and finding its history based on the climate drivers. The group then proposed numerous measurements in order to answer these questions and detailed a sequence of missions and architecture to complete the measurements. In all, several missions are required, including an orbiter that can characterize the present climate and volatile reservoirs; a static reconnaissance lander capable of characterizing near surface atmospheric processes, annual accumulation, surface properties, and layer formation mechanism in the upper 50 ​cm of the PLD; a network of SmallSat landers focused on meteorology for ground truth of the low-altitude orbiter data; and finally, a second landed platform to access ~500 ​m of layers to measure layer variability through time. This mission architecture, with two landers, would meet the science goals and is designed to save costs compared to a single very capable landed mission. The rationale for this plan is presented below. In this paper we discuss numerous aspects, including our motivation, background of polar science, the climate science that drives polar layer formation, modeling of the atmosphere and climate to create hypotheses for what the layers mean, and terrestrial analogs to climatological studies. Finally, we present a list of measurements and missions required to answer the four major questions and read the climate record. 1. What are present and past fluxes of volatiles, dust, and other materials into and out of the polar regions? 2. How do orbital forcing and exchange with other reservoirs affect those fluxes? 3. What chemical and physical processes form and modify layers? 4. What is the timespan, completeness, and temporal resolution of the climate history recorded in the PLD

The Holy Grail: A road map for unlocking the climate record stored within Mars' polar layered deposits

In its polar layered deposits (PLD), Mars possesses a record of its recent climate, analogous to terrestrial ice sheets containing climate records on Earth. Each PLD is greater than 2 ​km thick and contains thousands of layers, each containing information on the climatic and atmospheric state during its deposition, creating a climate archive. With detailed measurements of layer composition, it may be possible to extract age, accumulation rates, atmospheric conditions, and surface activity at the time of deposition, among other important parameters; gaining the information would allow us to “read” the climate record. Because Mars has fewer complicating factors than Earth (e.g. oceans, biology, and human-modified climate), the planet offers a unique opportunity to study the history of a terrestrial planet’s climate, which in turn can teach us about our own planet and the thousands of terrestrial exoplanets waiting to be discovered. During a two-part workshop, the Keck Institute for Space Studies (KISS) hosted 38 Mars scientists and engineers who focused on determining the measurements needed to extract the climate record contained in the PLD. The group converged on four fundamental questions that must be answered with the goal of interpreting the climate record and finding its history based on the climate drivers. The group then proposed numerous measurements in order to answer these questions and detailed a sequence of missions and architecture to complete the measurements. In all, several missions are required, including an orbiter that can characterize the present climate and volatile reservoirs; a static reconnaissance lander capable of characterizing near surface atmospheric processes, annual accumulation, surface properties, and layer formation mechanism in the upper 50 ​cm of the PLD; a network of SmallSat landers focused on meteorology for ground truth of the low-altitude orbiter data; and finally, a second landed platform to access ~500 ​m of layers to measure layer variability through time. This mission architecture, with two landers, would meet the science goals and is designed to save costs compared to a single very capable landed mission. The rationale for this plan is presented below. In this paper we discuss numerous aspects, including our motivation, background of polar science, the climate science that drives polar layer formation, modeling of the atmosphere and climate to create hypotheses for what the layers mean, and terrestrial analogs to climatological studies. Finally, we present a list of measurements and missions required to answer the four major questions and read the climate record. 1. What are present and past fluxes of volatiles, dust, and other materials into and out of the polar regions? 2. How do orbital forcing and exchange with other reservoirs affect those fluxes? 3. What chemical and physical processes form and modify layers? 4. What is the timespan, completeness, and temporal resolution of the climate history recorded in the PLD