During a meeting held in New Delhi, the international police intelligence agency Interpol announced that it had opened an antenna in the metaverse.
For the agency, it is not only a question of being present in already existing virtual universes, but of creating its own, which is already a reality. If the effectiveness of the approach remains to be demonstrated, it must be recognized that the police authorities took hold of this technology and the subject of crime 3.0 relatively quickly.
What can we do ?
During this meeting of the general assembly of Interpol, members of the agency unveiled their little house surprise: a metaverse entirely devoted to the fight against international crime. Registered users can take a virtual tour of the replica of the real offices of the agency, located in Lyon. This universe was developed internally, on the InterPol Cloud, to ensure its neutrality and its protection against hacking.
It is also possible for them to communicate with each other via their avatars to exchange information. Finally, the objective is that the police officers who go there can follow various training courses related to their profession, in scientific analysis or other police techniques. All of this of course while sometimes being thousands of kilometers from their interlocutor.
Why is Interpol going into the metaverse?
Jürgen Stock, Secretary General of Interpol, justified the arrival of his agents in this new space as follows: For many, the metaverse seems like a distant and abstract future, but it offers possibilities that have always interested Interpol: helping individual member countries fight crime and making the world, whether virtual or not, safer for its inhabitants. In a report published on October 19, the agency said that the share of crimes committed online was growing every year compared to that of crimes committed in the “real world”. It also stresses that the development of these new technologies would inevitably be accompanied by new forms of crime, and that it was therefore necessary to prepare for them as well as possible and as quickly as possible.
Given this observation, this arrival of Interpol in a new space whose rules are still largely to be defined is therefore rather logical. Especially since, citing a study by the consulting firm Gartner, the authors of the announcement recall that by 2026, a quarter of the world’s population will spend at least one hour a day in one of the metaverses. Beyond the supposed importance that these could take on, Interpol believes that this technology is also more practical for strengthening cooperation between its various antennas and makes it possible to promote remote work.
Sources: Interpol, Cryptocast
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