While today's   police forces are decreasing in number and their resources are limited,   population is at the same time increasing. This means that other types of   efforts and strategies are needed to fight crime. There are different   strategies to do this, one of which is called community policing that   involves proactive cooperation between citizens and the police to deal with   the problems. Traditionally, community policing meant that a local police in   the neighbourhood called for physical meetings, where citizens and police   together raised problems and discussed solutions to these.

With today's   limited resources, there is little possibilities for the police to execute   this kind of physical collaboration and meetings. On the other hand, another   meeting place has been added (the one online) and an alternative way to   implement community policing may be online. With digital channels for this   purpose, there may also be an opportunity to reach groups of citizens that   the police have not reached before, but in order to do so, it requires work   and a use of these digital channels in the right way according to community   policing.

The purpose of   this paper is to investigate what challenges and requirements that needs to   be taken into consideration when implementing community policing with the   support of digital communication channels. For this purpose, qualitative   research in the form of literature studies and semi-structured interviews   were conducted.

Findings show   there are a lot of challenges and requirements to consider and there are   guidelines in the analysis and discussion section, to help begin to implement   this way of working.

The practical   implications for this thesis may help police improving their relationships   with citizens in vulnerable areas to be able to cooperate according to   community policing to make these areas a better and safer place to live.