Running head: THE USE OF FACEBOOK BY POLCE

The Use of Facebook by Police:
RCMP Compared to Municipal Departments
By
Jonah Lachapelle

Applied Research Project Report
Bachelor of Law Enforcement Studies
Justice Institute of British Columbia

Marie E. Graf, MA, Instructor
Janelle Shoihet, Sponsor

April 9, 2018

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Abstract

This study examined how the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) can effectively use
social media when compared to the municipal police departments in the province of British
Columbia, Canada. Relevant literature on the police use of social media was reviewed examining
the benefits, strategies, and potential risks. Quantitative data was collected from the Facebook
pages of 12 RCMP detachments and 11 municipal departments. All posts from the month of
January 2018 were analysed and categorized based on what the posts were about. Qualitative
data was collected from literature to support conclusions drawn from the quantitative data. How
the posts made on the Facebook pages can affect the public’s view of the police were discussed.
Recommendations on how the RCMP can tailor their current resources into their social media
strategy to fit the specific needs of the individual communities they police were made.
Recommendations for further studies were also made.

Keywords: police, social media, Facebook, public opinion,

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Table of Contents
Contents
Abstract ........................................................................................................................................... 2
Background ..................................................................................................................................... 4
Research Question and Rationale ................................................................................................... 5
Literature Review............................................................................................................................ 6
Benefits of Using Social Media .................................................................................................. 7
Strategies ..................................................................................................................................... 8
Risks.......................................................................................................................................... 10
Summary ................................................................................................................................... 12
Research Design and Methodology .............................................................................................. 13
Methodological Assumptions ................................................................................................... 13
Data Collection ......................................................................................................................... 13
Data Analysis ............................................................................................................................ 15
Findings......................................................................................................................................... 17
Policy ........................................................................................................................................ 17
Populations and Followers ........................................................................................................ 18
Posts on Facebook..................................................................................................................... 21
Findings in the Literature .......................................................................................................... 22
Discussion ..................................................................................................................................... 24
Conclusions and Recommendations ............................................................................................. 25
References ..................................................................................................................................... 26

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Background

Social media has become an integral part of our society. People use it to stay in contact
with old friends and have social connections outside of work and school. People also use it to
engage with celebrities and politicians. With the popularity and use of social media increasing
almost exponentially over the past decade, government agencies quickly jumped on board,
creating accounts that allowed them to engage with the public and allowing the public to engage
back (van de Velde, Meiger, & Homburg, 2015, p. 4). Things that were previously available only
through traditional media networks like the news, newspapers, magazines are now available on
social media networks like Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, or Twitter.
It is no longer good enough for government agencies wanting to share information with
the public to simply put in it the weekly paper or wait for the evening news. Social media has
granted the public immediate access to almost any information by typing a few key words and a
couple clicks of the computer mouse. For government agencies to keep up, their use of social
media was necessary.
As more and more government agencies made information readily available on social
media networks, police agencies had to join as well. Police agencies serve and protect the public,
and in a way answer to the public, and have to constantly share information with the public.
Schneider (2016a) quotes the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) National Executive
Associates (2013) in his book Policing and Social Media saying, “the question is no longer
whether the police will use SM [social media], it is just how quickly and how well we will do it!”
(p. 63).
Many police agencies have started using social media networks as a way of
communicating and engaging with the public. In 2011, the Toronto Police Service launched a

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new social media strategy that saw not only the force itself have a social media account, but also
the force’s separate divisions, as well as individual officers. By November of 2011, 177 Toronto
Police Service members had corporate accounts which allowed them to engage with the
communities they were policing like never before (News Staff, 2011). Their social media
strategy has constantly involved since then, but at it’s core it maintains the same goal: “Prevent
crime, improve relationships with the community, humanize law enforcement by demonstrating
a genuine care and concern for public safety, and to provide further information about where
direct complaints,” (Carter, 2016). As a whole, police agencies are using social media networks
to engage with the public more than ever before, and the use of social media will only continue
to rise in the future, clear successful social media strategies are important for police agencies to
adapt to ensure that their use of social media is having the maximum impact it can have.

Research Question and Rationale
There are currently three levels of policing in Canada: municipal, provincial and federal.
Policing is a provincial responsibility. Municipalities of over 5000 people are required to provide
their own police force, however, they can contract with the provincial police force to police their
municipalities. The provinces are responsible to provide policing to municipalities of under 5000
people but can contract with the federal police force to provide provincial policing. The ability to
contract with another police agency to provide the necessary police services has led to the RCMP
fulfilling both provincial and municipal policing roles as well as their federal policing roles.
Unlike municipal departments that are responsible for policing one municipality, The
RCMP is responsible for policing a wide variety of municipalities all throughout Canada. These
can range from large cities with hundreds of thousands of people to small towns with less than

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one thousand people. Where municipal departments can focus their social media strategies on the
specific needs of the community they police, the RCMP must consider the needs of the wide
variety of communities they police. This research project looked at how the RCMP can
effectively use social media when compared to municipal departments in the province of British
Columbia.
Of the thirteen municipal police departments in British Columbia all but one of them
have social media accounts on Facebook. Their use of social media can be considered fairly
simple when compared to the police force in Canada. Municipal departments are able to apply a
social media policy that directly applies to their community. Because the RCMP polices
communities all across their community their social media policy needs to afford individual
detachments the ability to engage the specific community they are policing.
This research project looked at how the RCMP can effectively use social media at a
community level when compared to municipal police departments. It examined how they are
currently using social media, as well as what strategies they could adapt moving into the future.
This research project did not critique or discredit any police force based on their social media
use. It compared different social media strategies by different police forces around the world by
analysing the current literature and addressed potential opportunities for change and
development in the social media strategy of the RCMP.

Literature Review
Because social media is a new tool being used by police forces around the world,
literature on the subject is recent and applicable to this research project. Literature I reviewed
covered the benefits of the police using social media and how it can affect and improve their

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relations with the public and the community they police. I also reviewed current strategies that
are used by police departments around the world on social media and addressed some of the risks
that arise when police use social media.
I used the Camosun College Library and the Justice Institute of British Columbia (JIBC)
Library criminology and criminal justice databases to conduct my literature search. Articles that
highlighted common themes that applied to this research project were reviewed to explore what
the literature says about police and social media. Articles from all over the world were reviewed
in order to not only see the North American perspective but also the international perspective of
police using social media. Common themes were found throughout the literature. It is important
to highlight that these themes were not geographically specific. Articles from Canada, the United
States and Europe all shared common themes speaking of the benefits of police using social
media, the different strategies used on social media by police, and the risks that arise from police
using social media.
Benefits of Using Social Media
The first common theme found throughout most of the literature I reviewed is theme of
the benefits that police using social media can have. When examining public opinion,
communities tend to have a perception that the police department has greater community
relations when they are on social media (Beshears, 2017), and the public also tends to have more
trust in police agencies that engage the public on social media (Ruddell, & Jones, 2013). Social
media also has the power to strengthen perceived police legitimacy (Grimmelikhuijsen, &
Meijer, 2015) because the public views the police officers more as humans and members of the
community rather than just police officers (Meijer, & Thaens, 2013).

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This highlights a theme that when police departments use social media has a tool to
engage the public three key things happen: the public sees and acknowledges the police
departments efforts, the public trusts the police more, and they see the police as a more
legitimate institution. In a time where the police need to be fostering good relationships with the
public social media can be used as a beneficial tool in police and community relations (Harms, &
Wade, 2017).
Strategies
The second theme identified the application of strategies that police agencies use on
social media to ensure that their online presence is having the most impact it can have. Posts
made by police agencies can be separated into three main categories. Push posts, pull posts and
networking posts. Push posts are simply one-way communication posts where the police release
any kind of information to the public but don’t require the public to engage back in anyway. Pull
posts actively ask the public to engage with either the police organization or among themselves.
Networking posts aim to share informal information about the organization outside of the official
policing capacity. These are the posts that show the human side of the organization (Yun,
Qunfang, Xing, & Bort, 2017).
As part of the networking strategy, some police agencies allow individual officers to have
personal account in an official capacity. This means that officers control accounts that are
decentralized from the control of the agency has a whole. They may post about their shift, dayto-day activities and even activities they participate in off duty. There are of course guidelines
provided by the agency to ensure protected information remains protected. While these
decentralized accounts tend to outnumber the centralized departmental accounts within these
agencies, the centralized accounts tend to share more formal information while the decentralized

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accounts share information that fosters positive relationships among the public, focussing on the
networking side of policing (Meijer, & Torenylied, 2016).
Presentational strategies where officers are allowed to post on their official police
accounts while off duty also shows the human side of the individual officers. Making posts about
non-policing activities that take place in their everyday lives “delineates the individual officer
from the organisation in an official capacity and diminishes the appearance of authoritarian
relations” (Schneider, 2016b, p. 143).
What a post actually contains can actually increase the chances of it being shared. Social
media posts rely on whether or not members of the public are following the police agencies page.
However, if followers share the police agency’s posts on their own accounts, then it reaches out
to more members of the public that do not follow the police agency’s page but follow someone
who does. Posts with URL links, hashtags and pictures are more likely to be shared on other
people’s walls and reach more members of the public (van de Velde, Meijer, & Homburg, 2015).
The strategies mentioned throughout the literature are not limited in the way where only
one can be used at once. They are not strategies that a police agency would adopt to cover their
overall use of social media. They are instead strategies that can be used all at the same time.
Each individual post that police agencies make on their social media page can have certain
aspects of each strategy. One post may be a “push” post like updating commuters about a car
crash in the morning, the next may be a “pull” post asking the public to help locate a missing
person or identify a suspect in a crime, and the next post may be a “networking” post showing
police officers engaged in a community event.

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Risks
The final theme found throughout the literature are the possible risks that come with the
use of social media. Another thing that social media has allowed people to do is show much
more of the private life than ever before. The same applies to law enforcement agencies and
officers. Although one would like to think that an officer’s personal life would have little to no
impact on their professionalism on duty, but cases from around the world show the risks of
officers having social media accounts, and how it has actually worked its way into court
proceedings.
During the trial of Mr. Waters in the United States, the MySpace account of arresting
officer Vaughan Ettienne was called upon as evidence during the proceedings. Mr. Waters was
being charged with a felony possession of a 9-millimeter Beretta and a bagful of ammunition. He
claimed that the arresting officers planted the gun to justify breaking three of his ribs during the
arrest. Certain statuses that arresting officer Mr. Ettienne posted in the weeks leading up to the
trial were used as evidence to question his professionalism. Mr. Ettienne made a comment about
feeling “devious” just days before the trial started. Weeks prior to that, he posted as a status
stating “watching ‘Training Day’ to brush up on proper police procedure” (Dwyer, 2009). The
movie mentioned stars Denzel Washington as a detective and the movie glorifies police
corruption and brutality. Those two comments were enough for the jury to question Mr.
Ettienne’s professionalism and Mr. Waters’ felony charge was dismissed and he was only
charged with a misdemeanor for resisting arrest.
Another case in New South Wales saw the trial of a man who assaulted off-duty officer
Constable Robert Hogan. The defendant claimed that the incident happened while both were
intoxicated. Posts on Constable Hogan’s Facebook page about his drinking were brought into

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court and portrayed him as an unprofessional heavy drinker (Munro, & Bibby, 2009). The
defendant eventually pled guilty to a lesser charge but not before the personal life of Constable
Hogan was put on display for all to see.
Another risk that is present is how officers or departments associate with other users on
social media. In a case from New York, Mr. Johnson, the black defendant, was facing firearms
charges. The defense linked the arresting officer, Sergeant Dustin Edwards, to a Facebook group
titled “N.Y.P.D. officers who are threatened by superiors and forced to be victims themselves by
the violence of the West Indian Day massacre” (Glaberson, 2011). The Facebook page
essentially expresses concern and displeasure for officers who are assigned to work the West
Indian Day Parade which often involves violence. Mr. Johnson was arrested in the parade area.
Defense stated that because Sgt. Edwards was a member of this group where racist remarks were
posted that the firearm Mr. Johnson was being charged over was in fact not his and was planted
on him. The jury ultimately acquitted Mr. Johnson with Sgt. Edwards’ membership to this group
being a major deciding factor in the case.
These three cases show a potential negative outcome from police officers having social
media accounts where their personal and private life can be attributed to their professional
careers. The social media platforms used by police encourage them to share aspects of their
private lifestyles in the same way that it encourages regular citizens to do the same (Schneider,
2016b). Poor judgements made in their private lives can cast a shadow over the officer’s and
potentially the agencies accountability and legitimacy (Goldsmith, 2015).
Another risk that presents itself through social media is not one that has arose because of
social media but has received more attention than ever before because of social media. The
subject of police brutality has been a controversial topic which media as fueled over the past

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number of decades. Police use of force “rarely, if ever, photographs well” (Skolnick, & Fyfe,
1993). Major incidents of police brutality like the Rodney King incident that gained international
headlines used to appear on the evening news and in the weekly newspaper. The critical element
that allowed the Rodney King incident to gain the attention it did was the undisputable narrative
that the video showed (Lawrence, 2000, p. 63). Now with the advancement in technology and the
avenue that social media provides, the public now has the ability to record a video of any
incident of police use of force, label it police brutality and post it on social media.
The strategies that can benefit police agencies on social media mentioned previously have
also been used by the public in a negative way against the police. When the New York Police
Department started a networking campaign on Twitter with the hashtag #myNYPD the public
used it as a way of posting incidents of police use of force, titling it police brutality, and drawing
attention to the issue of police brutality rather than the positive promotion that the NYPD was
hoping for when the campaign first launched (Jackson, & Foucault Welles, 2015).
Summary
Although the literature shows a few isolated incidents of the negative affects that police
use of social media can have, the benefits shown in the literature far outweigh the negatives. As
the generation that grew up with social media starts to enter adulthood, police agencies need to
engage them on social media. People between the ages of 18-60 tend to have a much more
negative view of the police compared to those over the age of 60 (Jackson, & Foucault Welles,
2015). However, that age group of people is the age group that is most active on social media as
the use of social media decreases as age increases (Ruddell, & Jones, 2013, Harms, & Wade,
2017). Yet the more law enforcement agencies disseminate information about crime the more
trust the public has in the police (Harms, & Wade, 2017). While social media presents law

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enforcement with a great opportunity to share and disseminate information, the general audience
on social media appears to hold more negative views of the police. This gap may suggest that if
police agencies use the proper strategies to engage more with the younger generations that lack
trust in them the police can foster more positive relationships with the public.
Research Design and Methodology
Methodological Assumptions
Because the literature suggests that the use of social media by police agencies has the
potential to foster a better relationship with them, build trust, and increase police legitimacy I
examined how the police agencies in British Columbia, Canada are using Facebook. I examined
the differences between the municipal departments and individual detachments of the RCMP.
My assumption that led to this question was that because the RCMP is a federal police force,
their use of social media within individual detachments would be different when compared to
municipal departments. The RCMP delivers policing services to a wide range of community
varying greatly in population numbers across the country. Municipal departments are responsible
for providing policing services to one specific community and can tailor their social media
presence to accommodate that specific community. The RCMP may face challenges to establish
a social media presence suited to each individual community they police across the country. This
led me to my research question of how the RCMP can effectively use social media when
compared to municipal departments in the province of British Columbia.
Data Collection
For data collection I used a mixed methods approach. Qualitative data was collected by
searching and analysing current literature on the use of social media by police agencies. Articles
selected for this study discussed the strategies used on social media by police agencies and the

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benefits of police using social media to engage with the public. Quantitative data was also
collected by analysing 23 Facebook pages. 12 of the Facebook pages were RCMP detachment
pages. 11 of the pages were the Facebook pages of the municipal departments in British
Columbia. Data collected from these pages included the number of people who liked the page,
the number of followers the page had, and all of the posts made during the month of January
2018.
The difference between “liking” a page and “following” a page is as follows:
When an individual likes your page on Facebook, they automatically opt into following
your page. This means that your posts will be seen in their feed and you will be listed in
their ‘liked’ directory. It’s important to know that users can unfollow your page after
liking your page, which means won’t see your content very often. (Gravesandy, 2017).

All RCMP detachments that have their own individual Facebook pages were analysed.
These included Coquitlam, Golden-Field, Kaslo, Kimberley, Langley, Nanaimo, North
Vancouver, Port McNeil, Ridge Meadows, Smithers, Surrey, and Vanderhoof. Out of all the
municipal police departments in British Columbia all but one of them have a Facebook page. The
police departments of Abbotsford, Central Saanich, Delta, Nelson, New Westminster, Port
Moody, Saanich, Vancouver, Victoria and West Vancouver all have Facebook pages. The police
department from Oak Bay is the only municipal department that does not have a Facebook page.
The Victoria Police Department also polices the township of Esquimalt and has a Facebook page
specifically for that division so that Facebook page was analysed as an individual police
department. I also obtained some of the social media policy from Sergeant Janelle Shoihet, a
member of the RCMP in media and social media relations.

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Overall, the data collected from 12 RCMP Facebook pages and 11 municipal police
Facebook pages was analysed for qualitative data. Using the 2016 Census Profile released on
February 8, 2017, the population of each municipality was also collected.
Data Analysis
All of the posts made during the month of January, 2018 on all of the Facebook pages
were sorted into 8 categories: calls for assistance, community outreach, crime updates, missing
persons updates, recruitment, reminders, traffic updates, and general updates. Calls for assistance
were posts that asked the public to help identify a suspect or find a missing person, or any other
type of posts that asked the public to assist the police in any capacity. Community outreach posts
were networking posts that showed officers involved in the community outside of the official
policing roles. This could include showing officers talking at a school or involved in a
community event.
Crime update posts involved updating the public about crime in the municipality, a recent
crime that occurred or a recent arrest of a suspect or suspects related to a crime. Missing persons
updates were posts that updated the public on the whereabouts of a missing person, if they were
found, or if they were found deceased. Traffic updates were specific posts about car accidents,
road closures or whether conditions that would impact traffic.
Recruitment posts were about recruiting new officers, volunteers or civilian positions
within the department. Reminder posts were general reminders about leaving your phone alone
while driving, reminding the public to account for extra time in their commute for bad weather
conditions, reminders to drive safely in the winter weather or other general reminders about
safety. Update posts were general updates about things to do with the department, the community
or other updates that didn’t fit into any of the other update categories.

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When analysing the posts under the classification of the push, pull and networking
strategies previously outlined I classified crime updates, missing person updates, traffic updates,
and general updates as push posts. Calls for assistance, recruitment and reminders were classified
as pull posts because they all called upon the public to engage in some sort of activity. Whether
or not the public actually engaged in that activity is irrelevant. The community outreach posts
were classified as the networking posts as they were the posts that showed the human side of the
police force.
For the analysis of the populations of the municipalities two of the RCMP detachments
police two municipalities. The detachment of Golden-Field serves as the police detachment for
both the town of Golden and the town of Field (RCMP, 2017a). The detachment of Ridge
Meadows serves as the police detachment for both the municipality of Pitt Meadows and the
municipality of Maple Ridge (RCMP, 2017b). For these RCMP detachments the populations of
the two municipalities they police were added together.
After analysis, the data from the Facebook page for the North Vancouver RCMP
detachment was excluded from the study. The North Vancouver RCMP did not start their
Facebook page until January 12, 2018. I deemed that this was not sufficient data to properly
compare that page with other RCMP pages and other municipal pages. Overall, the data collected
from 11 RCMP Facebook pages and 11 municipal police department Facebook pages was
included in this study.

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Findings

Policy
In order to understand the framework that the RCMP Facebook pages were working
under, my sponsor for this research project, a member of the RCMP, was able to share some of
the RCMP’s social media policy. The RCMP has a national social media policy, and each
division or province has its own social media policy as well. Individual detachments also have
the power to make their own social media policies as long as anything they add follows the
national and provincial policies. The following information regarding policy is specifically
related to detachments in British Columbia.
In the province of British Columbia, also known as E Division to the RCMP, there are
four regions. Each region has a media relations officer as a supervisor for that region. Each
detachment also has its own media relations officer. The media relations officer in each
detachment is the one in charge of maintaining that detachment’s social media accounts. Officers
must go on a one-week media relations training course and then complete a mentorship usually
under the regional media relations supervisor. When the role of media relations officer is left
empty at a detachment either due to a change-over or a lack of resources the role is then filled by
the regional supervisor.
Once a detachment has a media relations officer, and the decision has been made to make
a social media account the officer is given a choice to start a Twitter account or Facebook
account. It is usually recommended that detachments start off with a Twitter account as it is a
little less labour intensive than Facebook accounts. If the decision is made to start a Facebook
account, the media relations officer has to demonstrate what their long-term plan to continue the
maintenance of that social media page is. Within that plan they have to demonstrate how they

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will keep their Facebook page censored and ensure that it only contains appropriate content.
Because other people are able to comment on Facebook posts more so than Twitter posts, the
officer must demonstrate that they will be able to monitor those posts.
As for what is posted, it is entirely up to the media relations officer running that social
media page what kind of content they post about. The only restrictions are those laid out in the
national, provincial, and possibly local policies. When it comes to individual officers having
social media accounts in an official policing capacity the RCMP does not allow officers to be
identified as police officers on any personal social media accounts, nor does the RCMP provide
individual officers with individual accounts.
Another policy that municipal departments do not have that the RCMP must abide by is
the Official Languages Act. Because the RCMP is the federal police force, some of their posts
may have to be shared in the two official languages of Canada: English and French. During the
collection of data for this study, no posts were found in French on any of the RCMP
detachment’s Facebook pages.
Finally, the RCMP self monitors their Facebook pages. Each month the province runs
statistics on what is working and what is not. The exact details of what working is and what not
working is was not shared with me. However, the RCMP examines what posts are most
successful and sharing the necessary information. Whatever is deemed to be working and not
working is filtered down to the detachments. The detachments can then make decisions about
what they want to change in their future posts based on the recommendations of the province.
Populations and Followers
To understand the differences between the communities that the municipal police
departments police and the communities that the RCMP detachments police I first looked at the

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difference in population between all of the communities analysed. The municipality with the
lowest population policed by a municipal department was Nelson, policed by the Nelson Police
Department with a population of 10,572 people. The municipality with the lowest population
policed by the RCMP was Kaslo with a population of 968 people.
The municipality with the highest population policed by a municipal department was
Vancouver, policed by the Vancouver Police Department, had a population of 631,486 people.
The municipality with the highest population policed by the RCMP was Surrey with a population
of 517,887 people. The average population of municipalities included in the study policed by
municipal departments was 115,193, compared to the average population of municipalities
included in the study policed by the RCMP which was 90,027. So, on average the municipal
police departments with Facebook pages are responsible to provide police services to 25,166
more people when compared to the RCMP detachments with Facebook pages, making the
RCMP detachments police only 78.1% of the people that municipal agencies would police on
average.
The second thing I analysed was the outreach that each social media page had in relation
to the number of people that police detachment or department policed so, I looked at the number
of people who liked the page as well as what percent of the population liked and followed the
pages. Just because a person had liked the Facebook page does not mean that they live in that
municipality, so it can be assumed that the number of likes a page has does not directly reflect
the exact percentage of the population of that municipality. Therefore, when it is said that a
percentage of the population likes the page it means what percentage of the population the
number of people that like the page reflect.

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On average the RCMP Facebook pages had 2,182.91 people like their page. The most
liked page was Surrey with 9,085 people liking their page. The least liked page was Smithers
with only 302 people liking their page. For municipal departments, the average number of people
that liked their page was 6,806.18. Vancouver had the most people who liked their page with
25,960 people. The least liked page for municipal departments was Central Saanich with only
963 people liking their page.
On average, 2.42% of the population policed by RCMP detachments liked their page. The
most liked page by percentage of the population was Kaslo with 34.71% of the population
having liked their page. The least liked page by percentage of the population was Langley with
only 1.05% of the population having liked their page. Compared to the municipalities policed by
municipal departments where 5.91% of the population having liked their municipal police
department’s Facebook page. The most liked page by percentage of the population was Victoria
with 13.8% of the population having liked their page. The least liked page by percentage of the
population was Nelson with only 2.38% of the population having liked their page.
Another ability that users on social media has is the ability to “follow” a page. The
difference between “liking” a page and “following” a page was outlined previously in this report.
All of the RCMP Facebook pages had a higher number of followers than they had people who
had liked the page. On average the RCMP Facebook pages had 52.36 more people follow their
pages compared to people who liked it. All of the municipal departments except for New
Westminster, Vancouver, and West Vancouver also had more people follow their pages
compared to people who liked their page. New Westminster, Vancouver, and West Vancouver
had less people following their page compared to people following their page. This suggests that
people who had already liked their pages decided to unfollow them and stop viewing their

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content. On average the municipal departments had 52.82 more people follow their pages
compared to people who liked it. This shows that between the RCMP and municipal departments
there is no significant difference between the amount of extra people who follow their page
compared to those who like it.
Posts on Facebook
When analysing the posts that all of the pages made I found that the RCMP made a total
of 134 posts during the month of January and municipal pages made a total of 242 posts. The
RCMP page that made the most posts was Coquitlam with a total of 64 posts. The average
number of posts for all of the RCMP Facebook pages for the month of January was 12.27. Two
of the RCMP pages had not even made a post during the month of January 2018. Port McNeil
had not made a post on Facebook since December 16, 2017 and Smithers had not made a post on
Facebook since June 19, 2017. The municipal page that made the most posts was Vancouver
with a total of 48 posts. The average number of posts for all of the municipal department
Facebook pages for the month of January was 22. Although the page that made the most posts
was the Coquitlam RCMP page, that initiative is not shared by all of the detachments. All of the
municipal departments had made at least 2 posts during the month of January.
For the number of posts made in each category, the RCMP made posts in 7 of the 8
categories, while the municipal departments made posts in all 8 categories. When totalling the
number of posts from all of the RCMP pages they made: 11 calls for assistance, 31 community
outreach posts, 20 crime update posts, 10 recruitment posts, 50 reminder posts, 7 traffic update
posts, and 5 general update posts. None of the RCMP pages made a single missing person update
post during the month of January. When totalling the number of posts from all of the municipal
department pages they made: 31 calls for assistance, 82 community outreach posts, 53 crime

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update posts, 11 missing person update posts, 20 recruitment posts, 39 reminder posts, 3 traffic
update posts, and 12 general update posts.
When examining the posts made under the push, pull, and networking posts the RCMP
made 32 push posts, 71 pull posts, and 31 networking posts. So, 23.88% of the posts were push
posts, 52.99% were pull posts, and 23.13% were networking posts. Municipal departments made
79 push posts, 90 pull posts, and 82 networking posts. So, 32.64% were push posts, 37.19% were
pull posts, and 33.88% were networking posts. While the RCMP appears to post a higher
percentage of pull posts, these posts also include reminders such as not to participate in
distracted driving, or to drive carefully in inclement weather. The municipal departments even
out their posts among push, pull and networking posts.
When examining the posts made by the police forces that are directly related to the
specific community that they police, 55.22% of the RCMP posts were specific to the community
they police while 79.34% of the municipal departments posts were specific to their community.
These include the posts under the categories: calls for assistance, community outreach, crime
updates, missing person updates, traffic updates and general updates. These are posts that address
or reference the municipality that they live in. This shows that a much higher percentage of posts
made by municipal departments are directly related to the community they police and would
have little to no affect on people living in other communities policed by a different police force.
Findings in the Literature
Several findings were made in the literature that highlight why police should be using
social media, strategies that work on social media, and the benefits that come from officers
having personal accounts attached to their policing duties. When looking at posts made by either
RCMP or municipal departments regarding calls for assistance in identifying a suspect or

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locating a missing person there is empirical evidence that shows that this method actually
increases the likelihood that people are identified or found.
Harms and Wade (2017) found that posts on social media asking the public to help
identify a suspect or locate a missing person led directly to tips that closed approximately 15% of
cases from some departments. Another article, by Schneider and Trottier (2012), showed how the
Vancouver Police Department used Facebook to help identify suspects of the 2011 Vancouver
Stanley Cup Riot. After the Vancouver Canucks lost in game seven of the Stanley Cup finals, to
the Boston Bruins in Vancouver, a massive riot ensued. Photos of the riot were quickly uploaded
to Facebook. The Vancouver Police Department took an unusual approach to using social media
with this incident. Police could not forcibly seize footage of the riot from bystanders or
participants but were able to use footage that was uploaded by participants and bystanders on
Facebook. By October 31 2011 the police had processed “over 30 terabytes of data” and “over
5,000 hours of video” (Schneider, & Trottier, 2012, p. 67) that was simply uploaded by the
public. They also called on the public to tag anyone they could identify in those videos. This type
of policing was termed “crowd-sourced” policing. The public did the police’s job by identifying
suspects.
As stated previously in the literature review, several other strategies have been shown to
increase the benefits of the police using social media. In order for the posts made by police
agencies to reach more than just the people following the pages the posts need to be shared. Posts
are more likely to be shared when they include hashtags, URL links, or pictures (van de Velde,
Meijer, & Homburg, 2015). Strategies can also be used to increase the view that police officers
are members of the community rather than just an authoritative ruling force. Allowing officers to
have personal accounts attached to their policing duties shows the public the human side of the

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police force and can increase the amount of trust the public has in the police (Schneider, 2016b;
Schneider, & Trottier, 2012).
Discussion
The data collected for this study shows that municipal departments on average police
more people in their communities, have more followers on their Facebook pages, have a higher
percentage of the population they police follow them on their Facebook pages, create more posts
on Facebook, and create more posts that are directly related to the community they are policing.
While the RCMP has a higher number of officers, those officers are spread out among a greater
number of communities. The resources that municipal departments have are much more
centralized in their departments. RCMP detachments sometimes do not even have the resources
to maintain a Facebook account, and when they do, that Facebook account is sometimes
maintained by a regional supervisor rather than the media relations officer in the community.
The RCMP does share a higher percentage of pull posts that call upon the public to
engage in an activity with the police or amongst themselves. However, these posts can be generic
posts that can be shared to any community. These can be posts that ask the public to not text and
drive or drive safely in dangerous weather. Municipal departments create a much higher
percentage of posts that are directly related to the community they police. These posts would not
make sense if posted by other police departments. This may show an incentive by municipal
departments to create posts more tailored to the specific needs of their community.
Strategies that have been shown to work within the literature are being used by both
RCMP Facebook pages and municipal Facebook pages. Several of the posts created by both
RCMP and municipal departments contained hashtags or URL links leading followers to another
page with more information.

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Conclusions and Recommendations
Throughout the province of British Columbia, Canada there is almost an equal amount of
Facebook pages for RCMP detachments and municipal police departments. Based on my
findings municipal departments tend to create more posts directly relating to the community they
police. These posts can have the power to show the public that the police are more engaged with
the community. The RCMP however is limited by the resources they have in each detachment.
This research project does not suggest that the RCMP are not as engaged in the community when
compared to municipal departments. Literature from all around the world shows that the more
police share information related to their community on social media, the more the public is likely
to trust the police and there is an increase in perceived police legitimacy (Meijer, & Thaens,
2013; Grimmelikhuijsen, & Meijer, 2015; Beshears, 2017).
The RCMP may not have the ability to allocate more resources into maintaining their
social media pages within each detachment. However, if they allocate the resources they have in
a way that addresses the specific community they police the literature shows that three key things
will happen: the public will see and acknowledge this, the public will trust the police more, and
they will see the police as more legitimate (Meijer, & Thaens, 2013).
Due the time limitation of this study I was unable to examine the social media policies of
any of the municipal departments and how that is reflected in their social media pages. This
study could be expanded to examine the differences in social media policy between the RCMP
and municipal departments, and how those difference lead to differences in the operation of their
social media pages. It could also be expanded to cover multiple social media accounts rather than
just focusing on Facebook.

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