The South African Police Service (SAPS) is modernising its crime-fighting investigative capabilities by seeking advanced solutions for analysing crime scene forensics and investigating money laundering. The tender requirements include not only specialised hardware and software, but also essential services like training, maintenance and ongoing support.

The five-year tender (Tender 19/1/9/1/01 TR (24)) closed on 14 November 2024, marking a step forward in addressing sophisticated crime in South Africa as police have struggled with investigating organised crime and money laundering.

Traditional crime scene analyses will be boosted with new automated investigative tools. Improving on the long-established methods of examining fingerprints, the tender calls for fingerprint quality enhancement software able to accommodate the capturing of fingerprint and shoeprint images as well as enhancing the images. The solution must also provide a comprehensive audit trail and allow for the creation of a digital chart for presentation in court.

Additional facial/image quality enhancement software is required to enhance low resolution degraded still images of suspect faces to high quality images in order to enable facial identification. The software must be able to automatically generate a report detailing all the processing steps, settings and algorithm used in analysis, as well as the source information for presentation in court.

The new facial recognition/mapping software (biometric face matching software) must be able to identify human faces in images and determine if the face in two images belongs to the same person, even from different angles and poor lighting conditions.

In a dramatic effort to improve the skills of crime scene investigators, new three-dimensional (3D) crime scene simulation software must be able to assist in the training and equipping of crime scene examiners by testing or assessing their observation skills and knowledge of crime scene processing. When using the software, the trainee will wear a headset that produces a 3D image, allowing the trainee to virtually walk through the crime scene.

Recognising the importance of technology in combating financial and organized crime, the SAPS is also looking at forensic accounting investigative tools to tackle complex crimes and organised syndicates.

eDiscovery (electronic discovery) is the process of finding, reviewing and collating digital information to be used as evidence in legal procedures. SAPS requires an eDiscovery solution able to convert documents from any format, producing working papers that can perform Computer Assisted Audit Techniques (CAATs) and data analytics. These capabilities should support the analysis of bank statements, trend analysis in financial statements and other financial information.

For financial and asset forfeiture investigations, the document conversion software (OCR) must have a high volume scanning capability, capable of converting paper documents and images into readable digital data formats.

In all cases, comprehensive initial and ongoing training for SAPS personnel must be provided, as well as software and hardware support.

The integration of these advanced tools should enhance the SAPS’s ability to combat financial crimes and improve crime scene forensics and investigations, increasing efficiency and boosting public trust by enabling faster crime resolution and improved prosecution rates.