Policing an area as vast as Western Australia is a testing business. To extend the long arm of the law in the world''''s geographically largest law enforcement jurisdiction, the Western Australia Police Service is looking to new technology for a helping hand. The potential benefits were demonstrated during a recent pilot project conducted by the WA Police in conjunction with Fujitsu and Microsoft - with emphatic results.

The pilot used hand-held computers and high-speed wireless communications to provide officers on patrol with direct access to databases holding information about people and vehicles. Compared to the existing voice radio queries, the technology boosted the number of queries conducted during routine police operations, leading to a dramatic improvement in identification of people who were wanted by police for matters as serious as armed robbery and drug trafficking.