“Obviously, trying to track and make sense of the literally millions of messages that are flying around every minute requires specialist filtering and tracking tools and we’ve already seen the emergence of a number of these”, says Read. “Trendsmap, for example, provides global real-time analysis and mapping of Twitter keyword trends, while Cisco’s SocialMiner solution, although created for enterprise marketing, could also be powerful in a control room context and is something we’re already looking at integrating.

“In the Netherlands, there’s a very interesting application called Twitcident that the Dutch fire brigade are already trialling. This aims to improve the information supplied to emergency services during big incidents by presenting the most reliable and trustworthy tweets, searching on keywords and zooming in geographically on areas of interest or concern.

“In terms of keeping in touch with communities, tracking interactions with members of the public and providing reassurance either in one-off situations or where particular communities have ongoing issue to do with, for example, anti-social behaviour, we’re now adapting our CRM system ASPIRE to integrate social media as another medium that sits alongside existing email, SMS, voice and web support.”

Contact with the public

Peter Goulding, a public safety specialist at Motorola in the UK who has 35 years of experience with the Metropolitan Police in London, also sees public reassurance as one of the key benefits of these new approaches. Another is in helping to put across the police’s perspective in contentious or sensitive situations.

He says: “It’s possible to set up appropriate social media communications strategies for different levels – from the policeman on the beat using Twitter, for example, in a specific small community dealing with highly localized issues, up to a commander responsible for a larger area engaging with more strategic issues through a live web chat interface.

“Where major incidents are involved as well, such as terrorist attacks, existing public mobile networks may have been shut down or become overloaded – along with the switchboards of the emergency services themselves. Having alternative media in place helps communicate important information to the public.

“There are also a number of projects underway where social media is helping the police actively catch criminals”, Goulding adds. “The Metropolitan Police are still using Flickr, for example, to identify rioters and looters caught on CCTV systems during last August’s disturbances, as well as return stolen property to its rightful owners.

“There are, however, important issues to do with privacy, security and confidentiality of digital information that need to be resolved, especially when dealing with the kinds of very large data sets involved with video – and given the need for full disclosure of evidence to be shared with the defence. Any police whose roles involve them publishing on social media require training in what is and what isn’t legal and what information may be sub judice” – that is, information which, if published, might prejudice an impending trial.

Unreliable information?

Jeff Gillan, product area manager for Cassidian Communications, highlights just one of these vulnerabilities: “There have been a number of cases in the US recently of what’s become know as ‘SWATTing’, where an emergency services caller claimed to have information on an incident that led to completely innocent people having their homes raided by SWAT teams. Using call address spoofing techniques, it has possible to fool the emergency services into misdirecting a response team and it’s vitally important that incoming information is effectively validated.

“That said”, he adds, “most effort in the area of social media is currently going into finding more efficient ways for public safety organizations to reach out to their communities and there are variety of initiatives here at local, state and national level involving bodies such as APCO, NENA and FEMA to develop best practice guidelines that are effective across what are often very hierarchical structures. There are also a number of companies promoting other types of solutions, such as Rave Wireless.”

Rave Wireless, now renamed Rave Mobile Safety, provides a number of services such as its Smart911 offering, which enables the public to create enhanced profiles of themselves and their families. These profiles can be accessed by the emergency services to help responders with more than just the basic caller ID and rough location. Information stored and shared can include such details as medical or allergy conditions, the number of children in the house or pictures of the children. In June, Arkansas became the first US state to deploy Smart911 state-wide.
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