…apparently mundane and banal data practices … matter because once scaled up and part of the analytical baseline for predictive policing, they ‘make’ particular versions of criminal futures. Crime prevention measures then become directly affected by the performative effects of crime data that are in turn mediated by design and usability on digital devices.
From the police point of view, this is, needless to say, considered problematic.
Matthias Leese (2023) Enacting criminal futures: data practices and crime prevention, Policing and Society, 33:3, 333-347, DOI: 10.1080/10439463.2022.2112192