Wireless Warrant System Leverages Cloud as Crime-Fighting Tool
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For a California district attorney’s office, the “speed aspect of being a cloud-based solution is significant.”
Is the cloud law enforcement’s next great crime-fighting tool?
For law enforcement agencies around the country, the gap between finding out about a possible crime and getting a warrant can make all the difference in making a major arrest.
Butte County in Northern California, roughly 80 miles north of Sacramento, may have found a solution that could permanently change the way police investigate and solve crimes.
In 2012, officials at the county’s Office of District Attorney partnered with DocuSign on a project that led to the nation’s first wireless warrant system.
“The idea came from our DA who said we’re in the 21st century let’s modernize this process,” Albert Tong, information systems analyst with the county government, said in a recent interview. “DocuSign already did electronic signatures for real estate and Fortune 500 companies. We needed it for search warrants and signatures on search warrants.”
The process sounds simple enough but in practice highlights the incredible potential of cloud computing in public-private partnerships.
Now, when law enforcement officials need a warrant, they sent the request electronically to a judge who can then remotely approve and sign the document. The warrant is just as valid as one signed on physical paper and literally saves hours of unnecessary waiting time.
“They are able to get a new search warrant in less than 30 minutes, which was faster than the bad guys could pass along a warning in a phone call,” Miles Kelly, DocuSign’s head of marketing, said in an interview. “The speed aspect of being a cloud-based solution is significant and it provides the security of being in an environment that we manage.”
While the story of wireless warrants is eye-catching, DocuSign has been working with state and local governments across the country on a number of other cloud-based solutions.
For example, DocuSign worked with Utah State University to speed up the rate in which professors can apply for, and obtain, research grants. And in North Carolina, the company helped the state government save over $300,000 on paperwork and postage expenses alone. In Nevada, contract procurement was expedited from an average of 30 days down to just five.
“The opportunity for DocuSign is to change the way governments operate. Paper and signatures are everywhere in just about every type of business and entity. In particular that’s true for government,” Kelly said. “One of the beauties of DocuSign is the viral effect. Once people taste the nectar of efficiency, it spreads pretty quickly.”
And with rapidly accelerating adoption rates for cloud computing, it’s becoming increasingly intuitive for local governments like Butte County to implement cloud-based solutions.
“Once everyone got on board in the system, it was like riding a bicycle,” Tong said. “Having judges set pen to paper to sign search warrants is "so 20th century."
Eric Pfeiffer is a journalist based in Los Angeles.