Police NRW and social media

Social media have fundamentally changed our world and our actions and are increasingly shaping everyday police work.

Children today are more likely to learn how to use apps or a computer mouse than how to swim, ride a bike, tie their shoes or make their own breakfast. Connecting to smartphones and social virtual worlds is an everyday and popular activity. When 16-year-olds write an average of 1,000 messages per day on social media, for example, this seems like a lot in the eyes of their parents, but is normal in their peer group.

Social networks are the number one source of information and the population's virtual clinical thermometer. No television crew is ready to report faster than the people on the ground with their smartphones.

The police have not been able to ignore this trend in society as a whole and have been facing up to the major challenge of exploiting the highly competitive virtual information market for themselves for several years now. Of course, the aim is not to cut costs, increase profits and sales figures or win new customers. The police want to use social media, for example, to recruit new recruits or provide information in crisis situations.

The police authorities in NRW are currently using social media. There is also a central NRW police YouTube channel.

How can you recognize the real police on social media

Unfortunately, there are of course also many social media offerings that look deceptively similar to real police offerings. Police press releases, images and emblems are used to give the impression that it is a police page. The NRW police are taking action against the operators of these sites using all the legal options available to them.

A police website can be recognized by the following features:

• it has a uniform naming convention (NRW police and name/name abbreviation of the police authority).
• It has a uniform address convention
  • Facebook: facebook.com/Polizei.NRW.authorityabbreviation)
  • X @polizei_nrw_authorityabbreviation
  • Instagram: @polizei.nrw.authorityabbreviation
• it is certified by the platform provider (tick in blue circle).
• it features a police star with authority logo.
• Data for making contact outside the social network is provided

Data protection in social media

Data protection in social media is important to the NRW police. You should therefore take the time to read the following data protection information before using the links to police services on social media.

Data protection information for X

By clicking on "Follow", you become a follower of the police account, which is visible to the administrators of the page as well as to your friends and possibly other X users.

This information is neither analyzed nor collected elsewhere by the administrators of the police account. The statistics that X makes available to the administrators of the police account are displayed in aggregated form and do not allow the administrators to draw any conclusions about personal data. In this context, please also note the data usage guidelines at https://x.com/privacy/ and make the appropriate privacy settings in your account! Please check exactly what information you publish!

What X learns:

What data X stores in detail and how the company uses this data is not exactly known. What is certain is that X not only stores data entered directly by users, but also records the actions of X users - presumably without gaps - and passes them on to third parties.

X also records

• the most important data of the computer system (log data) from which a user logs into the network - up to the IP address, processor type and browser version including plug-ins and
• every visit to websites (widget data) on which a X button is installed. The IP address is also transmitted. If the visitor to the third-party site is a X user and has already logged in to X from the same computer, X can also determine their identity.

Data protection information for Facebook

By clicking on "Like", you become a fan of the police page, which is visible to the administrators of the page as well as to your friends and possibly other Facebook users. This applies in particular to "likes" or comments on our posts, which are also visible to non-registered visitors and non-fans of this fan page. Even if you are not or do not become a fan of this page, you can leave comments or "Like" information on our posts that are visible to others and the administrators of the fan page. However, this information is neither analyzed by the administrators nor recorded elsewhere. The statistics that Facebook makes available to the administrators are displayed in aggregated form and do not allow the administrators to draw any conclusions about personal data. In this context, please also note the data usage guidelines at https://www.facebook.com/about/privacy/ and make the appropriate privacy settings in your account! Please check exactly what information you publish!

What Facebook learns:

What data Facebook stores in detail and how the company uses this data is not exactly known. What is certain is that Facebook not only stores data entered directly by users, but also records the actions of Facebook users.

Facebook also learns

• the most important data of the computer system from which a user logs into the network - up to the IP address, processor type and browser version including plug-ins and
• every visit to websites (widget data) on which a "Like" button is installed. The IP address is also transmitted. If the visitor to the third-party site is a Facebook user and has already logged in to Facebook from the same computer, Facebook can also determine their identity.

Privacy Policy for YouTube

YouTube is a subsidiary of Google, therefore the Google Privacy Policy also applies: www.google.de

What is the data collected for?

• User authentication
• Targeted advertising
• Analysis and research of user behavior
• Disclosure to third parties: The user accounts of all Google services converge centrally. The data collected is automatically linked to other Google services. Anonymized data is passed on to advertising partners and other third parties, e.g. to visualize trends and statistics

You can configure all settings centrally in the Google Dashboard.

General information on data protection

You can find information on the topic of "data protection" on the website of the responsible supervisory authority for data protection in North Rhine-Westphalia, the State Commissioner for Data Protection and Freedom of Information of North Rhine-Westphalia. www.ldi.nrw.de

We ask everyone to remember that real people are communicating with each other here. To ensure a constructive exchange on our social media channels, the community agrees on the following common values and rules of conduct: We respect our fellow human beings. We comment responsibly. We are constructive and polite.

• We only comment on the current post topic.
• Questions and ideas are welcome.
• Disagreements are part of life. We argue on a factual level and don't get personal. We criticize opinions and actions, not people.
• Before commenting/tweeting, we put ourselves in the other person's shoes. We check whether we would also say the sentence to a person's face in a conversation.
• If we are provoked or treated unfairly, the contact persons are the social media team of the Gütersloh district police authority.
• We stick to verifiable facts and are careful with assumptions, especially with accusations.
• We stand up for the Basic Law and an open, democratic society.
• We express ourselves clearly and comprehensibly. Irony and sarcasm can easily be misunderstood if you can't see/hear the other person.

The internet is not a legal vacuum! 

We do not tolerate

• insults, abusive language and degrading statements,
• unlawful content, e.g. incitement or instruction to commit criminal offenses; statements harmful to minors; statements that violate personal rights or content that infringes the copyrights or data protection rights of third parties,
• inflammatory, racist, obscene, discriminatory or pornographic content,
• misleading claims and untrue statements of fact,
• content that is associated with viruses, Trojans or harmful websites,
• content that is inappropriate, inaccurate or misleading, Trojans or harmful websites or are otherwise likely to impair the use of the site or the user's IT system,
• spam / copy & paste of own comments,
• contributions with personal data, commercial contributions and third-party advertising,
• links are generally not permitted and will be hidden or deleted by us. This is to prevent users from being redirected to fraudulent sites, e.g. by subsequently changing the websites they have saved.

As the police, we stand for law and order. You can and may expect the same from us on the Internet! In the case of comments that violate the law, we initiate appropriate proceedings, hide the comments and block the user. If you notice any possible legal violations on our pages, please inform us.

Users whose comments have been hidden or deleted or whose account has been blocked or blocked can informally enquire about the reason for the measure. To do so, please send an email to oeffentlichkeitsarbeit [at] polizei.nrw.de (oeffentlichkeitsarbeit[at]polizei[dot]nrw[dot]de). In addition, the terms of use of the respective social network and our privacy policy apply.

We hope you enjoy sharing your opinions!