Wednesday

It was with great excitement that we arrived in Apeldoorn on the afternoon of Wednesday, November 15, 2023. As members of the Steering Committee, we had been preparing for this event for many months, and now we were here. Hearing the excited voices of arriving participants, the greetings, and small talk during dinner at the monumental hall at the Police Academy, we whispered to each other: ”This is going to be good!”

Gathering people interested in all the different aspects of Policing in the Digital Society was, of course, a good idea. From the abstracts we had received beforehand and the guest list, we knew we had reached the right people. There was certainly a basis for interesting presentations, debates, networking, and enjoying the company of very nice and openminded people.

Initially, a heartfelt thank you and applause were given to Wouter Stol (Dutch Police Academy/NHL Stenden) for bringing people together and facilitating the development of the Policing in the Digital Society Network. As Inger Marie Sunde (Police University College Norway) mentioned, it is thanks to Wouter and his dedication to this project that the Conference in Apeldoorn became a reality.

The conference opened with an interesting keynote presentation from Professor Dr. Jens Erik Paulsen (Police University College Norway) on the topic of moral challenges in digital policing, followed by Professor Dr. ir. Jan Terpstra (Radboud University Nijmegen) with very thoughtful perspectives on digitalization and local policing, specifically in relation to street-level bureaucrats’ strategies.

Thursday

The program on Thursday was packed with a lot of exciting presentations, starting with the keynote presentation from Dr. Gill Tully (King’s College London) on the challenges of understanding uncertainty in digital intelligence and evidence, followed by Dr. Lauren Waardenburg (ESSEC Business School France) with the presentation: 'It takes a village: the ecology of explaining AI.' Then, Prof. Dr. Jur. Birgit Feldtmann (Aalborg University) shared the challenges for criminal law in relation to hybrid threats, illustrating with examples such as ships being hacked.

The afternoon was divided into four different tracks: 1) Our digital society and its police, 2) Everyday policing and digital technologies, 3) Predictive policing and AI, and 4) Digital evidence. Here we were treated with extraordinary insights from presenters, which led to very interesting discussions. Of course, in this setting, it was very difficult to balance the eagerness to discuss and elaborate on different matters with the timeslots in the program. This is the same old struggle: keeping to the agenda while facilitating discussions, networking, and participant enthusiasm. Without using too strict management, we believe we overall succeeded; at least, no one was late for supper.

Friday

Marijn Schuurbiers from Europol Cybercrime Centre, EC3, initiated the program of the day with a presentation on countering cybercrime from the Europol perspective. Referring to Europol’s recent activities, the takedown of digital infrastructure was elaborated, particularly in relation to the communication platforms EncroChat and Sky ECC. We were provided with insights from the takedown in April 2023 of Genesis Market, an online platform where digital identities of over two million people were listed for sale. After the purchase of such a digital identity ('bot'), the buyer would be able to perform various types of cybercrime, such as identity theft, hacking of systems, fraud, etc. The takedown was carried out in collaboration between the FBI, Dutch National Police, with Europol as the coordinating facility.

With great humor, Marijn Schuurbiers provided us with a visual expression of Europol’s strategy: The bowl of spaghetti and meatballs. The spaghetti represents the criminals, and the meatballs represent the criminal platforms of digital infrastructure. Occasionally removing one meatball would limit the criminal facilities and, consequently, criminal activities. All while recognizing that this is an ongoing struggle; new criminal platforms will emerge, and a constant consideration must be made regarding criminal use versus legitimate use before using the ultimate tool of takedown by law enforcement authorities.

The program continued with an interesting presentation on digital victimhood from Jildau Borwell (Dutch National Police/Open University), followed by the interesting perspectives on the legal regulation of surveillance measures given to us by Dr. Ingvild Bruce (Police University College Norway).

At the end of the conference, we, as organizers, are very thankful for your support in attending the conference and for your contribution to the content, discussions, and networking.

We also wish to express our gratitude to our very professional and skilled assistants, Simone, Marja, and Ivette, who facilitated the program and provided us with excellent food and snacks throughout the conference. At its peak, we had 104 people attending the conference, and the logistics of it all were very professionally handled!