Hong Kong police have introduced a self-service kiosk at a major MTR interchange station to help people report lost items, saying it was part of a bigger plan to drive “digital policing” in the city.
The force held a ceremony for the launch of the first police self-service kiosk in a public space at Admiralty station on Thursday. The kiosk, which resembles a touch-screen ATM machine, aimed to help people report lost property and other non-emergency cases to the police.
Raymond Siu, the Commissioner of Police, said during the ceremony that “digital policing” had been the force’s aim since 2019, and the force had already set up kiosks in several police stations since 2021.
“This is a milestone in the development of digital policing services,” Siu said in Cantonese.
The self-service kiosk was also proposed in the “Smart Government” initiative mentioned in last year’s Policy Address, Siu added.
The digital policing device is one of the 13 police self-service kiosks currently in operation, Siu said, adding that the devices have processed over 15,000 lost property reports in the past three months.
Tony Lee, Operations and Innovation Director of the city’s sole railway provider the MTR Corporation (MTRC), said that the company would work with the police on a system that allowed lost property reports to be shared.
Speaking to reporters after the ceremony, police Director of Operations Chan Tung said the data transfer would be encrypted in accordance with cybersecurity standards.
Other than reporting lost property, residents and tourists could also make use of 14 police services through the kiosk, including reporting suspected crimes and traffic incidents, Chan said.
Admiralty station is the largest intersection in the MTR network connecting four MTR lines: the East Rail line, the Tsuen Wan line, the Island line, and the South Island line.
The police will consider placing self-service kiosks in other major interchange MTR stations such as Tai Wai station and East Tsim Sha Tsui Station, as well as at border control points and in large shopping malls, the police added in a press release.
Hong Kong has seen a sharp rise in crime recently, recording 58,453 crime cases in the first eight months of this year, a 34.6 per cent increase compared with the same period last year. In particular, fraud-related crime has increased by 52.2 per cent year-on-year, security chief Chris Tang said last week.
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