GIS for Crime Analysts

British GIS company, Cadcorp, has made significant updates in its latest software release, Cadcorp SIS 9. In particular, new functionality has been added to Cadcorp SIS Desktop to support the requirements of Crime Analysts. This functionality is included within SIS Desktop and without the requirement for Police Forces to license additional modules or add-ons. Police Forces have the option to purchase single concurrent licences or make use of an enterprise desktop licencing option.

To support law enforcement activities, crime analysts utilise a number of methods for identifying and analysing patterns and trends in crime data. SIS Desktop offers, as standard, the processes necessary for these tasks and includes:

Hotspot analysis – Cadcorp has extended the support for KDE hotspots to include Getis-Ord (Gi*). Getis-Ord (Gi*) can be used by Crime Analysts to identify areas where the clustering of crime is statistically significant.

Thematic mapping – In addition to existing options for thematic maps (Ranges, Classification, Labels, Bar Chart, Pie Charts, Graduated, Dot Density, Topology and many more), SIS Desktop includes a Bivariate Theme option. Applying a Bivariate theme is appropriate when Crime Analysts need to compare two attributes on the same map. This for example, would include crime type and demographics.

Routing analysis – Crime Analysts often need to calculate travel time along a network. SIS Desktop presents a range of routing options such as isochrones, multipoint routing and match points. For example, match points can be used by analysts to calculate likely vehicle routes from CCTV or ANPR data.

Cell site analysis – The Process option in SIS Desktop provides Crime Analysts with tools to complete cell site analysis. For example, a Process can be used to buffer a cell tower by its range, and calculate an area of overlap with other cell towers.

Temporal analysis – Time is key to understanding crime patterns and trends. New functionality in SIS Desktop enhances the query and display of temporal data. A time slider allows analysts to play back a range of temporal data such as crime and vehicle locations.

Cadcorp SIS is used by a number of UK Police Forces for a variety of tasks. While SIS Desktop is used for crime analysis, Cadcorp SIS WebMap is used for the distribution of spatially related data over an intranet. Cadcorp also offers developer components to provide a GIS capability to Command and Control systems, such as Sopra Steria STORM.

For further information visit: http://cdcp.io/policegis