196501-492093 FOI Policy

This FOI request pertains to your use of third-party investigative software, which considers software used to collect, analyse, and report on issues / breaches of policy in your council.
Examples of this software include case management, financial investigation, digital forensics, and covert operations software.
If some data is not available or falls under an exemption, please respond with the available information, and provide an explanation for each missing or exempted item.
1. Please list the departments that conduct investigations into issues / breaches of policy (e.g. for fraud, planning enforcement, licensing, etc.) in your council?
a. Please list the approximate number of FTEs (full time employees) that work on investigations in each department?
b. If not covered in question 1.a., please also note the number of total FTEs focused on fraud (and note the number of fraud specialists specifically) in your council?
2. Considering third-party investigative software (e.g. for case management, financial investigation, covert operations, etc.), is this software typically procured by a centralised council IT team or by each investigation department?
3. What was your councils overall spend on third-party investigative software last year? £…k
4. In percentage terms, approximately how has your overall spend on third-party investigative software, on an annual basis, changed over the past 3 years?
a. Why (e.g. increase in number of users within existing departments, increase in departments, adopting new software, price increases, etc.)?
5. Please populate the below table, specifying if your council uses the listed third-party investigative software categories, noting your annual spend for each and your current software provider(s) if so.
Note that the total annual spend across the below categories should approximately sum to the overall annual spend on third-party investigative software, as per Q3.
Category of investigative software Description Does your council use this type of software? Approximate annual spend, £k, last available year Name of your current software provider(s)
Case management software Software used as a central hub to manage cases (from incident to reporting), including to ingest and manage relevant evidence, track case progress, and prepare reports for court proceedings. Yes or No? £…k Name
Financial investigation software Software designed for extracting, cleaning, analysing and / or visualising financial data and information to investigate fraud or other financial crimes.
Covert operations software Software for planning, managing, and executing covert operations, including surveillance management, undercover operations, intelligence gathering and secure communication tools.
Other investigative software Please provide a high-level summary of what other includes: ...