FOI-1047-2025 / Oct 2025 / Digital forensics staffing & statistics
FREEDOM OF INFORMATION REQUEST REFERENCE NO: 1047-2025
I write in connection with your request for information which was received on 20th October 2025 as follows:
Q1. How many staff in your force/contractors are currently assigned to work on digital forensics (examining digital devices seized for evidence as part of investigations).
Q2. What is the current average time it takes to examine a device (from seizing to completion).
Q3. What is the current backlog of digital devices which your force needs to examine.
Q4. How many current investigations involve examining digital devices and what percentage of your total number of ongoing investigations is this?
Q5. What is the current waiting time for the device which has been waiting to be investigated the longest and what kind of allegation/investigation does this relate to?
Q6. If a contractor firm is used to carry out this work, could I please ask what it is and how much the firm is paid.
Q7. If the cost limit has not yet been reached, could I please ask what the answer was to question two in each of the most five recent calendar years. (IE) 2024, 2023, 2022, 2021, 2020.
Q8. If the cost limit has still not been reached, could I please ask for the answer to question three for 2024, 2023, 2022, 2021, 2020. Please provide an average backlog figure.
For question three, could I also have a breakdown of devices - ie phones, ipads etc.
Please find the Warwickshire Police response set out below.
Response: Please be advised that the requested information is not centrally recorded and is therefore not held in a readily retrievable format. There is no flag or marker to easily identify where an investigation has involved the examination of digital devices. In order to determine a response to Q4, it would be necessary to conduct a manual review of all ongoing investigations. As you will appreciate, this would take an inordinate amount of time and would be above the amount to which we are legally required to respond, i.e., the cost of locating and retrieving the requested information, exceeds the ‘appropriate level’ as stated in the Freedom of Information (Fees and Appropriate Limit) Regulations 2004.
In accordance with Section 12(1) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000, this letter acts as a Refusal Notice for this part of the request, and, if one part of a request exceeds the fees limit, then section 12 of the Act applies to the whole request.
In accordance with Section 16 of the Act, I have a duty to provide advice and assistance on refining your request; however, due to the volume of records that would need to be individually reviewed, I am unable to suggest a way to reduce this part of the request into one that could be managed within the fees limit.
Outside of the Act and as a gesture of goodwill, please find below the information I was able to retrieve before it was realised that the fees limit would be exceeded. I trust you will find this of assistance; however, please note that the provision of this information should not be taken as a precedent that additional information would be supplied outside of the time/fees legislation for any subsequent requests.
Q1 response: Please be advised that Warwickshire Police forensic service provision is provided by West Midlands Police, therefore our response is ‘no information held’.
Q2 response: No information held regarding ‘current average time’.
Whilst you have not requested this information, were you to do so I can advise that a request for the actual number of days taken to examine each device for a specified period would come under an exemption by virtue of Section 31 – Law Enforcement. This is due to the harm in identifying individual force capability and the potential to undermine ongoing investigations.
Q6 response: As previously advised, the Warwickshire Police forensic service provision is provided by West Midlands Police, therefore our response is ‘no information held’.
Q7 response: No information held.
Q8 response: No information held.
Every effort has been made to ensure that the information provided is as accurate as possible.
Your attention is drawn to the below which details your right of complaint.
Should you have any further enquiries concerning this matter, please write or email the Freedom of Information Unit quoting the reference number above.
Yours sincerely
Freedom of Information Officer
Freedom of Information Unit
Warwickshire Police
PO Box 4
Leek Wootton
Warwickshire
CV35 7QB