Simpson Associates, leading data transformation consultancy and managed service provider, are thrilled that the Tackling Organised Exploitation (TOEX) Programme have launched the TOEX Capabilities Environment (CE) for all eleven TOEX teams. As key delivery partner, Simpson Associates are delighted to have worked in partnership with the TOEX team to develop, implement and manage these tools.
This ground-breaking development will save investigations significant time and money, ultimately helping to protect more victims and pursue the criminals who would exploit them.
The complexities that accompany investigations involving organised exploitation are vast, caused by a multitude of factors including, high volumes of data or information, language barriers encountered in tackling cross-border criminality, or in the number of resource hours spent manually processing intelligence and evidence.
The launch of these tools through the deployment of a secure, assured and UK hosted cloud platform managed by Simpson Associates, will help the teams manage these complex investigations in a more effective and efficient way. The TOEX Capabilities Environment will act as an ‘app store’ for the developed tools and, following completion of mandatory training, will be available to TOEX resources to leverage against organised exploitation demand investigated at a force, regional and national level.
The technical development of each tool follows the principle of ‘operational business need driving innovation’. They have been specifically designed to tackle an identified policing problem, albeit many of them are suitable for deployment against a wide variety of policing threats. Some have been developed in-house by the regional TOEX Data Insight Analysts who sit side-by-side with operational intelligence and analytical staff.
This partnership of business requirements, industry collaboration, and addressing operational problems through technical enablers, has innovated and refined tools capable of generating substantial efficiencies in time and resourcing, thus allowing TOEX resources to focus on high-harm offenders and victims.
The TOEX Translation application, developed in partnership by Simpson Associates and the TOEX in-house team, is the first tool hosted in the TOEX Capabilities Environment. It utilises the AI translation capabilities provided by Microsoft Cognitive Services to bulk translate text files.
This tool has already been incredibly powerful in advancing several serious and complex investigations – include the translation of mobile device extractions and social media archives. By January 2024, the TOEX Translation application had been used more than 340 times and successfully translated more than 290 million characters for the total cost of £2,410.
The programme’s technical team is extremely busy testing other tools to add to the CE – these include the TOEX Transcription application, which has the ability to upload audio and video files such as victim and suspect interviews, body-worn video or control room calls, with the AI powered Microsoft Cognitive Services Video Indexer platform performing a transcription within minutes.
The launch of these tools for the TOEX Programme is indicative of an exciting time for innovation across policing, and the onboarding of more capabilities over the next Financial Year are in the planning.
About Simpson Associates
Simpson Associates (SA) is a leading UK Data Transformation Consultancy and Managed Service Provider, specialising in data transformation in the blue light sector. They believe in leveraging the power of data to connect and enable police forces in the UK. SA offer secure and easy access to data for analysis, incident crime reporting, crime mapping, demand planning, and fleet management solutions within the sector.
About The TOEX Programme
The TOEX Programme is an intelligence capability that provides dedicated intelligence and analytical expertise in support of forces undertaking complex organised exploitation investigations, such as modern slavery & human trafficking, organised immigration crime, county lines, adult & child sexual exploitation and abuse.
Built around existing structures, TOEX teams are embedded within each of the Regional Organised Crime Units (ROCUs), and ensure victims are safeguarded and those seeking to profit from exploitation - including localised criminality and the upstream organised criminality which drives it, are disrupted and brought to justice.