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tom not a pc

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Hi all, off the bat, I’m not a police officer, so feel a bit of a fraud being on here. That being said, I have some very specific questions and this forum seems like the best place to get an answer. There has recently been a huge rise In the number of American style ‘audit’ videos on YouTube, carried out in the uk, for those that don’t know what these are, it is supposed to be an honest attempt to raise awareness of good and bad police practices, however as they can be carried out by anybody, they often end up being a slagging match between the two parties, showing police officers in a bad light, and wasting their precious time. There are very few that accomplish what they set out to do, and then, still not very well, however, they are gaining a lot of followers and subscribers, I myself, enjoy seeing the interactions, but dislike the poor auditors approach of bating officers into making mistakes. 
I wondered if there is any sort of country wide, industry information/recommendations for you guys on how to spot these auditors and to deal with them more effectively? Or even just to make you aware of them? 
it often starts with the legal practice of filming outside the police station, in order to garner your attention. 
 

keep up the good work. 

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56 minutes ago, tom not a pc said:

Hi all, off the bat, I’m not a police officer, so feel a bit of a fraud being on here. That being said, I have some very specific questions and this forum seems like the best place to get an answer. There has recently been a huge rise In the number of American style ‘audit’ videos on YouTube, carried out in the uk, for those that don’t know what these are, it is supposed to be an honest attempt to raise awareness of good and bad police practices, however as they can be carried out by anybody, they often end up being a slagging match between the two parties, showing police officers in a bad light, and wasting their precious time. There are very few that accomplish what they set out to do, and then, still not very well, however, they are gaining a lot of followers and subscribers, I myself, enjoy seeing the interactions, but dislike the poor auditors approach of bating officers into making mistakes. 
I wondered if there is any sort of country wide, industry information/recommendations for you guys on how to spot these auditors and to deal with them more effectively? Or even just to make you aware of them? 
it often starts with the legal practice of filming outside the police station, in order to garner your attention. 
 

keep up the good work. 

Best advice is common sense - you ignore them unless they start doing something criminal which you would take action against, which is rare.

They ultimately crave attention from authorities as it increases their viewers and standing on Youtube and within the wider 'PINAC' community - some push boundaries more than others however I've seen extremely underhand practices carried out by 'auditors' where they deliberately misquote old guidance (in one example close to 15 years out of date) in order to try and 'show up' the officers on camera in order to prove a point on film and allow a 'click-bait' title. 

Personally I think legislation around police property is lacking, trespass is a civil matter and some auditors have been exploiting this by deliberately trespassing on police sites in order to provoke attention from police, an auditor I watched recently was deliberately 'planking' in a vehicle yard of a police station which would of course inevitably provoke a response, some have however exposed glaring security flaws such as unlocked doors in back yards etc - It has to be acknowledged that police stations aren't regular spaces, victims of crime, incredibly sensitive information on display in upper floors of offices etc that should rightfully be off limits to the public and ordinarily are, but the use of drones is now a concern however this can now be addressed under recent legislation prohibiting flying drones within 50metres of people in congested areas. 

Loads on this forum in relation to auditing, have a browse. 

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  • 3 weeks later...
19 minutes ago, IrateShrike said:

 

Bit of an amusing delivery but some good points raised.

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  • 4 weeks later...
On 09/01/2022 at 15:41, Radman said:

Best advice is common sense - you ignore them unless they start doing something criminal which you would take action against, which is rare.

They ultimately crave attention from authorities as it increases their viewers and standing on Youtube and within the wider 'PINAC' community - some push boundaries more than others however I've seen extremely underhand practices carried out by 'auditors' where they deliberately misquote old guidance (in one example close to 15 years out of date) in order to try and 'show up' the officers on camera in order to prove a point on film and allow a 'click-bait' title. 

Personally I think legislation around police property is lacking, trespass is a civil matter and some auditors have been exploiting this by deliberately trespassing on police sites in order to provoke attention from police, an auditor I watched recently was deliberately 'planking' in a vehicle yard of a police station which would of course inevitably provoke a response, some have however exposed glaring security flaws such as unlocked doors in back yards etc - It has to be acknowledged that police stations aren't regular spaces, victims of crime, incredibly sensitive information on display in upper floors of offices etc that should rightfully be off limits to the public and ordinarily are, but the use of drones is now a concern however this can now be addressed under recent legislation prohibiting flying drones within 50metres of people in congested areas. 

Loads on this forum in relation to auditing, have a browse. 

I think that is generally the advice from the bosses, the trouble is there have been a lot of instances of newbies approaching these people and coming unstuck, however, I did see one which was filmed at Derbyshire Police Headquarters and he ended up getting arrested and spent 8 hours in the cells, he didn't face any charges, maybe there was a reason for that, watched a few of this persons output and he does seem to be confrontational. A lot of sites like MI5/MI6/GCHQ, Buckingham Palace, St James Palace, RAF Lakenheath to mention but a few are not covered by the Serious and Organised Crime Act where trespass is a criminal offence, strangely Porton Down is covered by MoD Bylaws. The real problem is the attitude of "I can go where I like and do what I like and who are you to stop me!" has been endemic for the past couple of decades now, Auditing is a craze because people have go-pro cameras, drones and a youtube account which pays them money if there videos receive enough hits. If they don't get reaction from their activities then the video never gets posted, 

What does annoy me is that these idiots curtail the genuine and legal activities of photographers who have no interest in auditing!

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2 hours ago, The Greater Good said:

I think that is generally the advice from the bosses, the trouble is there have been a lot of instances of newbies approaching these people and coming unstuck, however, I did see one which was filmed at Derbyshire Police Headquarters and he ended up getting arrested and spent 8 hours in the cells, he didn't face any charges, maybe there was a reason for that, watched a few of this persons output and he does seem to be confrontational. A lot of sites like MI5/MI6/GCHQ, Buckingham Palace, St James Palace, RAF Lakenheath to mention but a few are not covered by the Serious and Organised Crime Act where trespass is a criminal offence, strangely Porton Down is covered by MoD Bylaws. The real problem is the attitude of "I can go where I like and do what I like and who are you to stop me!" has been endemic for the past couple of decades now, Auditing is a craze because people have go-pro cameras, drones and a youtube account which pays them money if there videos receive enough hits. If they don't get reaction from their activities then the video never gets posted, 

What does annoy me is that these idiots curtail the genuine and legal activities of photographers who have no interest in auditing!

I think our own bosses, the College of Policing etc have been hoodwinked by these people who use the excuse of basic photography to push the boundaries of what they can get away with. 

Realistically the auditors can very easily fall into the bracket of "protestor" they just do it in a sly way but often have extreme grievances with the police, local authorities or wider government agencies - curiously most from what I've seen seem to have criminal backgrounds and sit on the right of politics... They seem on paper atleast to be more concerned with traditional 'liberalism' concerns surrounding individual freedoms than any wider, social issues the left of politics concern themselves with (such as environmental, social justice etc.)

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  • 1 year later...

Seems that Auditing Yorkshire was arrested yesterday. Video starts with him opening up a police van and rummaging about inside before exiting. An officer soon comes out and arrests him for vehicle interference.

 

 

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Quite correct, he was not auditing, he was committing an offence. Streaming that he has just shown himself up for being an idiot, suggesting nicking the Police Van, or letting its tyres down. These are the idiots that the Police have to deal with.  I know my rights, sadly he does not.

Edited by Zulu 22
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On 26/04/2023 at 10:04, Zulu 22 said:

Quite correct, he was not auditing, he was committing an offence. Streaming that he has just shown himself up for being an idiot, suggesting nicking the Police Van, or letting its tyres down. These are the idiots that the Police have to deal with.  I know my rights, sadly he does not.

Some auditors like DJ have clearly done their homework and do actually seem to know their rights though. I've seen him repeatedly challenged by officers who insist that he's breaking the law only for him to calmly go through the legislation with them and demonstrate that he isn't. While it does make him look rather insufferable, it is genuinely a bit worrying to see so many officers wade in and try to assert their authority while not actually knowing what their powers in the situation are.

Something else I've noticed in these videos. Auditors will often ask an officer for their shoulder number and it seems like 90% of the time the officer refuses to just say what it is. Instead they do this thing where they sort of tip their epaulettes towards the camera and say you can see my number here. Why do they do that instead of just saying what their number is? They are obviously quite happy for the auditor to know the number, it's not a security concern, so why give it to them in that rather strange way. If someone asked me what my name was, would it not be a bit odd if I answered by writing my name on a slip of paper and holding the paper up to their face instead of just answering verbally?

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12 hours ago, Equin0x said:

. Why do they do that instead of just saying what their number is? They are obviously quite happy for the auditor to know the number, it's not a security concern, so why give it to them in that rather strange way. If someone asked me what my name was, would it not be a bit odd if I answered by writing my name on a slip of paper and holding the paper up to their face instead of just answering verbally?

Because the officers are people, being mugged off by some time wasting idiot and they don't generally like it. So they get a bit snippy. 

If you are asked your details and hand over a piece of paper, that's fine. It might be odd, but we meet lotts of odd people, no non verbal people, deff people, and people trying to be irritating. 

They should know their legislation better, but in the finer points of interaction, being chippy with someone who is irritating is not the gold but it is understandable. 

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2 hours ago, SimonT said:

Because the officers are people, being mugged off by some time wasting idiot and they don't generally like it. So they get a bit snippy. 

If you are asked your details and hand over a piece of paper, that's fine. It might be odd, but we meet lotts of odd people, no non verbal people, deff people, and people trying to be irritating. 

They should know their legislation better, but in the finer points of interaction, being chippy with someone who is irritating is not the gold but it is understandable. 

In most of the videos I've seen it happens right at the start of the interaction, and at point literally all the auditor has said to the officers is "first of all can you identify yourself and your shoulder number". That seems like a reasonable request asked in a perfectly civil manner to me. What about it do you think is irritating? The officers generally ask for the auditors details as well..


I also don't understand why some officers seem completely incapable of just backing down in these situations when its clear there are no offences. Why waste time going round in circles arguing for 20 minutes or mumbling about possibly using terrorism legislation when its obvious you dont genuinely suspect it? I've even seen officers complain that standing arguing with the auditor is leaving them further behind on filling out their crime files. But no one is forcing them to keep arguing so why doesnt that officer just disengage and go back to their work then? If you give officers the benefit of the doubt, maybe they just aren't sure of their powers and what they can and can't do. Maybe they feel that as police its their job to "do something" about and they dont realize they can (and should) just walk away in some situations. A less favourable interpretation is that some officers egos just can't handle a situation where someone is defying them and so they need to go looking for a way to show the auditor who is in charge.

I am sorry if that sounds particularly blunt but I've been watching a lot of these videos and those things always annoy me and seem to happen in the majority of videos. Any of you on here dealt with auditors and if you responded in this why?

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On 28/04/2023 at 20:53, Equin0x said:

Some auditors like DJ have clearly done their homework and do actually seem to know their rights though. I've seen him repeatedly challenged by officers who insist that he's breaking the law only for him to calmly go through the legislation with them and demonstrate that he isn't. While it does make him look rather insufferable, it is genuinely a bit worrying to see so many officers wade in and try to assert their authority while not actually knowing what their powers in the situation are.

Something else I've noticed in these videos. Auditors will often ask an officer for their shoulder number and it seems like 90% of the time the officer refuses to just say what it is. Instead they do this thing where they sort of tip their epaulettes towards the camera and say you can see my number here. Why do they do that instead of just saying what their number is? They are obviously quite happy for the auditor to know the number, it's not a security concern, so why give it to them in that rather strange way. If someone asked me what my name was, would it not be a bit odd if I answered by writing my name on a slip of paper and holding the paper up to their face instead of just answering verbally?

If he had done his homework he wouldn’t be tampering with a police vehicle 

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4 hours ago, Ether said:

If he had done his homework he wouldn’t be tampering with a police vehicle 

Auditing Yorkshire went way too far in this video and as for asking if he should steal it or let the tyres down, well as a certain character on television would say "what a plonker!"

DJ Audits is definitely more clued up though. If a business has "no public access" signs up he will comply with it and make a point of explaining to the viewer that he is not allowed to step foot on their land. So instead he gets as close as he can while still being on public land and then uses his zoom in camera or drone to film it, which is allowed. Definitely a more professional approach and is reasonably polite but will run rings around you if you try bluffing about your powers or are unsure of them.

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These auditors must be very sad people with nothing else to do but waste valuable Police time.

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