Guwahati police has launched a community-based real-time crime monitoring platform Crimatrix, reports The Times of India. This platform currently allows citizens in Guwahati to report vehicle thefts via SMS, which is apparently transmitted immediately to all police officers on the field. However, it notes that citizens have to file an FIR at a nearby police station and this service is meant to only reduce the time gap between the theft discovery & filing an FIR. To report thefts, citizens can send a text message "VT [Model], [RC No.], [Color], [Location], [Last seen Time]" to 09243405521. Senior Superintendent of Police of Guwahati, A. P. Tiwari told the publication that Crimatrix will shortly launch another service which will apparently provide real-time updates on the passport document verification process. Hotel & guest houses guest list submission The platform will apparently also help hotels, guest houses, lodges and clubs to register on the site to submit their guest records in real-time, thereby skipping the need to provide manual written reports to the Police. The report says Crimatrix already has more than 400 such places in its database. This move does raise some security & privacy concerns for consumers, however the site mentions that all hotels and guest houses are supposed to submit their guest lists to the nearest police station everyday, as per the The Sarais Act. (Also read: The privacy nightmare that no one in India talks about) Following submission, Crimatrix apparently cross-checks this data with existing crime records and alerts the nearest police station if there is any match. This platform was developed by Assam Police and Guwahati-based Glomindz Software and was launched…
