The Intelligence Methods Project broadly covers all law enforcement and security work relating to crime or intelligence collection, collation, analysis and dissemination. The project is deliberately articulated in broad terms as intelligence is a developing and innovative discipline and to allow for a strategic view of intelligence problems and importantly an opportunity for the research community to positively contribute towards resolving intractable problems experienced by our policing and security Industry Partners. The Project is articulated around a conceptual model developed by Ratcliffe (2003). This provides a succinct and coherent picture of our current projects at the ARC Centre of Excellence in Policing and Security (CEPS) and offers a map of research opportunities for the future.

The role of the Intelligence Methods Project at CEPS is summarised using the 3-i model offered by Ratcliffe (2003). The model explains the relationship between the criminal environment, which could describe any problem faced by policing or security agencies, the analysis which describes the role of the crime and intelligence analysis staff and the decision-makers who are the police or security management and senior executive who have control of resources and decision-making power to activate recommendations provided by the analysts and other advisors.

The model represents the connectivity between the three elements. Interpret, linking analysis to the criminal environment, shows how the role of the analytical team (crime or intelligence analysts) is to take meaning from what is observed in relation to a problem and turn this into an analysed product that identifies what the problem is, where it is likely to occur, when it will happen, who will be involved and how it will unfold. The most crucial aspect of the analytical process is to be able to draw inferences from the information, demonstrate support for the inferences and in some cases recommend possible courses of action based on past success and failures with similar problems.

The following studies will be conducted:

• The effective analyst. This study concerns collating a representative range of views from crime and intelligence personnel concerning the necessary attributes of an effective analyst. 
• The effective product. This study concerns a representative range of views on products concerning what makes an effective product.
• Simulation studies. These studies concern a number of simulation exercises that will be conducted to shed light on how analysts make decisions and to provide training opportunities.
• Synthetic data set. A synthetic data set will be created to model statistical algorithms of relevance to intelligence.
• Mapping analytical decision making. Analytical decision-making will be mapped in a variety of contexts.
• Influence of intelligence products. The Influence of sanitised intelligence products’ on decision-making will be investigated.
• Managers’ perceptions. Intelligence managers’ perceptions of current and future directions in intelligence will be solicited and documented.
• Effective practice. Effective applications of intelligence will be documented as exemplars of good practice.