By Chris Burt

A "Direction Statement" by INTERPOL Secretary General Jürgen Stock at the organization's 90th General Assembly last October notes that the INSIGHT analytical platform had already contributed to the dismantling of an international criminal organization.

The advanced analytics capability of INSIGHT is part of the project's second phase. The planned third phase involves drawing on external sources of data, like commercial databases.

INSIGHT's tools will eventually include "visual, video, audio recognition, facial and bio-data matching." The U.S. State Department has contributed $12 million to the project, Statewatch says.

That may not be enough, as Stock recently told Politico that the data analysis and biometrics capabilities would need to be sustained by tens of million of euros, which INTERPOL does not have.

Stock frames the challenge of the digital era for INTERPOL around reaping its benefits to tackle its threats.

That means "Supporting the digital transition for police means a stronger information backbone – able to support the 250 searches per second you are conducting in our databases, no matter what."