Karnataka CID takes to social networking to bust crime

In a first of its kind initiative, the Karnataka state CID has taken to social networking via sites such as Facebook and Twitter and plan to rope in citizens on thesesites to help them bust crime.

The initiative comes on the heels of the successful leveraging of the sites by investigators in the US and UK who found Facebook instrumental in hunting leads in criminal investigation.

According to senior crime department officials, police in Australia and Switzerland are also contemplating joining the networking sites.

Dr D V Guruprasad, director general of police, CID, says that law enforcement agencies stand to gain a lot from networking sites. "Such sites help policemen keep a tab on the crimes that occur in a particular community. Members of such communities can help investigators this way," Guruprasad said.

The initiative is the outcome of interaction between the state police and captains of IT / ITeS industry in Bangalore last month.

Guruprasad says being on social networking sites also lends and element of transparency to the administration of the department and additionally gets a certain amount of involvement from communities in fighting crime.