Police Cybercrime Training: Strategies, Delivery and Perceptions

This paper reports on a piece of HEFCE/College of Policing funded research exploring police officers’ experiences of undertaking cyber training in a large English police force. A number of issues emerged from the analysis of the data and, whilst police organisations are increasingly seeking to embed cyber knowledge and techniques as core generic skills amongst police officers, the data suggests that this has not been wholly successful. This is for a number of reasons. First, there remains some resistance from officers who believe that cyber knowledge and skills lie beyond the remit of non-specialist officers. Second, that some modes of learning delivery are viewed as substantially more effective than others. Third, that there remain some structural barriers to effective cyber training delivery at the organizational level. These findings are discussed within a context that acknowledges the tension between tacit and codified knowledge in police organisations and the subsequent debate between acquisitive and participatory models of police learning.