Article Writing Homework Help

You will prepare and submit a term paper on Local and Federal Sharing of Information for Law Enforcement. Your paper should be a minimum of 500 words in length. It is well known that computer technology has done much to connect law enforcement at the and local levels. An example of this fact will help to reveal the overall importance of such databases, and how they can make law enforcement investigation success faster and hopefully more easy to obtain. Databases can be used at the state and local levels to share various information about criminals, as well as other information. One such example is that of “The Interim Data Sharing Model (iDSM) is a pilot effort between the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Department of Justice (DOJ)/FBI.” (Federal Bureau of Investigation, n.d.)

This plan was put together by the DHS and the FBI in order to share information between their two systems. The overall aim of iDSN is “to achieve biometric-based interoperability with a reciprocal exchange of a small subset of DHS and FBI data. The FBI subset will include information on individuals with outstanding warrants for which biometric information exists (“Wanted Person File”). The DHS subset will include information on individuals who have been denied Visas or aliens who have been expeditiously removed from the United States.” (Federal Bureau of Investigation, n.d.)

Therefore, this database will allow both groups to access information about the various agencies. Data will be shared between the two agencies, and this includes copies of the database’s fingerprint information in order to assist with the comparison of fingerprints. Furthermore, the shared information also allows other data to be included, such as criminal history, biography, and any other relevant history which may also be significant above and beyond fingerprint sharing. All data is stored and accessible in the System of Records.

Users will also be able to access the FBI maintained criminal history of each individual through the database. This information will also permit users to gain information regarding individuals that do not have citizenship and should not be present in the United States.

Therefore, it can be concluded that databases can be very useful in the local and federal sharing of information for law enforcement. Databases can be used to make pre-existing information easy and quick to obtain, therefore making any investigations into dangerous individuals faster, and giving the population a greater safety benefit overall.

Federal Bureau of Investicagion (n.d.). “Privacy Impact Assessment Plan.” Retrieved August 13, 2009, from: http://foia.fbi.gov/idsm.