How police can prepare for AI, Doxxing and Disinformation

There is a shrinking gap between online agitation and real-world consequences, emphasizing the need for police to proactively monitor social media, rapidly disseminate verified information, and protect officers' digital footprints.

How police can prepare for AI, Doxxing and Disinformation is a recent episode of Police1’s Policing Matters podcast, hosted by retired San Francisco PD Deputy Chief, and Future Policing Institute Fellow, Jim Dudley. It addresses the growing threat of AI-driven disinformation, doxxing, and deepfakes to police operations and personnel. How police can prepare for AI, Doxxing and Disinformation highlights the shrinking gap between online agitation and real-world consequences, emphasizing the need for police to proactively monitor social media, rapidly disseminate verified information, and protect officers' digital footprints. The discussion also provides practical strategies for command staff and field supervisors to combat coordinated inauthentic activity and prepare for potential disruptions.

The five most important points made in the episode are:

1. Speed is the risk factor: The time gap between online agitation and real-world street action is significantly shrinking. To address this, law enforcement agencies should establish or task a small team to proactively monitor social media platforms before significant events like high-visibility dates, campus events, or enforcement operations, and then brief command on potential flash points.

2. Treat mis- and disinformation as an operational threat: It is essential to have an agile communications plan that allows for the publication of verified facts within minutes, not days. This involves pre-clearing spokespeople and having pre-written statements and graphic assets ready for rapid release across all agency channels.

3. Expect coordinated inauthentic activity: Bots and personas generated by Large Language Models (LLMs) can amplify false narratives and specifically target agencies or individual officers. Police should utilize basic bot-detection cues, archive posts for evidence, and prioritize resources on posts that include specific dates, locations, or calls for action.

4. Protect officers from doxxing and targeted harassment: Agencies must audit the digital footprints of both executive leadership and line personnel involved in controversial operations. Providing guidance on privacy settings, removing exposed Personally Identifiable Information (PII) where possible, and routing credible threats for criminal follow-up are critical steps.

5. Intelligence-to-operations handoff matters: Before deployments, it is crucial to provide field supervisors with a concise "digital threat picture". This intelligence should include information on likely organizers and tactics, expected turnout, critical infrastructure at risk, counter-protest indicators, and de-escalation considerations, all aligned with current arrest policies and evidence capture plans.

To Listen to the full episode, click here.

To read Jim Dudley’s bio, click here.