The Effective Use of Social Media in Crime Dectection and Prevention: The Promotion of Public Trust in the UAE Police - The Case of the Abu Dhabi Police

The  social  media  provided  police  agencies  with  many worth  capabilities  to  promote their crime control activities, which grounded in gaining the trust of the citizens. The literature review unearthed a lack of empirical studies on examining the potential role of Facebook (FB) users’ trust in facilitating crime information sharing with the police through various  social  media  platforms.  This study  endeavoured  to  replenish  this knowledge gap by identifying the causes and factors that could build Facebook users’ trust in participating in the Abu Dhabi Police FB regarding crime information sharing. The study developed a conceptual model based on the e-servicescapes concept of Harris and Goode (2010) and Harris and Ezeh (2008), which considered trust, communication efficiency, and customer’s purchase intention as crucial  factors  for  successful  online service, while Hohl’s work (2011) tested trust in police from a citizen perspective. 

The study employed FB, due to its global popularity, to investigate i) possible integration of FB as a tool in crime detection based ongained public trust; and ii) social acceptance towards disclosure of crime news on the ADP’s FB. The developed model answered these  research  questionsi) How  did  the  ADP  employ  FB  in  police-community communication to gain the desired public trust?,and ii) Did the gained public trust play a role in driving the users’ interest in sharing information regarding the detection of non-serious   crimes?The   mixed-method   addressed   these   questions.   The   survey participants (n=300) retrieved from the ADP’s database andconducted interviews with FB experts (n=20). The generated findings revealed that graphic design, functionality, content quality, and secure access to the ADP’s FB page were crucial in building users’ trust to support participation intention regarding non-serious crime issues.

The findings illustrated  demographic  features  of  the survey  participants,  where  the males  between 40-49 years represented 77.51% of the men (n=169), whereas females between 30-39 years represented 76.93% of women (n=39) whose trust motivated them to participate regularly in the ADP’s FB. The study concluded that the gained trust of FB users enhanced  reliable  information sharing  dedicated  to  non-serious crime detection. This study  contributed  to  developing  a  police  FB  model  to explain how  the  ADP officers considered  the  impact  of public  trust  on  deploying  FB  in  their  policing routines regarding non-serious crime detection.