E-Collaboration and Government - Collaboration Using Virtual Teams In Law Enforcement To Counter Internet Crimes Against Children

Post 9-11 and Katrina hurricane, law enforcement in the United States like in many other countries is under tremendous pressure to improve collaboration among themselves and with other departments. In a tradition bound, locally focused, autonomous law enforcement that traditionally has not felt a need to work with others, one way to enable collaboration is by information technology. In this paper, a qualitative study of a task force, that has successfully used peer-to-peer computing to collaborate against internet crimes against children is given. A multiple case study methodology to determine the factors that contributed to the effectiveness of collaboration in this task force is presented. The results show that by combining right organizational structure, processes, funding and technology this task force has been able to effectively prosecute perpetrators of crimes against children using the internet. This model can be used by other law enforcement agencies and organization that are similarly tradition bound and hierarchical.