Karnataka Forest Department launches centralised wildlife crime management system

Karnataka Forest Dept. launches HAWK system to monitor wildlife crime. Supported by NTT Data, it will help monitor activities such as wildlife death, suspicious vehicles, and criminal activities. Over 300 forest officers have been trained, with 500 more to be trained this year. System will help counter criminal activities and keep system updated to meet new challenges.

The Karnataka Forest Department, along with the Wildlife Trust of India, has launched the Hostile Activity Watch Kernel (HAWK) system, a specialised software platform to monitor all aspects of forest and wildlife crime.

Supported by digital services company NTT Data, the system would help the department monitor activities such as the death of wildlife, suspected criminal activities, and the movement of suspicious vehicles.

Information regarding these and other incidents of interest from the field would be fed into a centralised system so that effective and pre-emptive responses, including counteraction, could be initiated.

“The HAWK system will help the department to manage and monitor data regarding forest and wildlife crime across the State in real-time. This will increase the overall efficiency of the department in crime management,” saidSubhash K. Malkhede, IFS, PCCF (Wildlife) & Chief Wildlife Warden, Karnataka Forest Department.

Vivek Menon, Founder and Executive Director of Wildlife Trust of India, noted that the development of HAWK was initiated as there were no such systems present to manage information regarding wildlife crime and criminal activities. The system was first launched in Kerala about two years ago and has now been customised for the Karnataka Forest Department.

A team from the Karnataka Forest Department’s IT cell headed by Biswajit Mishra initiated the customisation process of HAWK approximately one year ago.

“The Wildlife Crime Control Bureau is in the process of taking HAWK as the national wildlife crime management system. We from Karnataka and Kerala should be proud that a system developed in these two States is becoming the national system,” said Jose Louies, director & chief (wildlife crime control) at WTI.