The Badger Watch App

How does the Badger Watch app work?

Once downloaded, the app guides users through the signs of badger activity, signs of illegal human activity (such as sett blocking, snaring, and baiting) and how to collect evidence safely and accurately.

 

Once evidence is collected, the location and crime information is submitted via the app, which generates an automatic report for Badger Trust to monitor. The app will also advise you when to call the police and how to keep safe all the while you are at the scene. You can also download our FREE step-by-step guide that talks you through each process of the app and its features.
 

The app has GPS location, does this mean that the app will track users when they leave public footpaths to monitor setts or badger tracks? 

Whilst there are GPS capabilities to the Badger Watch app, this simply allows for crimes to be pinned on a map for ease of reporting. However, GPS can be turned off at any time using your phone’s settings, in the same way that you would do for any other app on your device.  

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It is the smartphone that is tracking the GPS data and the app simply uses that information, as many apps do. It does not store this location separately; that is stored on the phone and the only location that is sent through to us is the location selected on the map. 

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In the interests of privacy, the GPS setting on your phone can be disabled and the app will still work, it just takes a bit longer to find the location of the crime you want to log. Coordinates can also be logged manually instead, just as you would do for reporting crime to the police or via the current Badger Trust online reporting system.
 

Who will have access to sett location data?

The way the app has been designed means that the sensitive crime and sett location data submitted through the app is shared with Badger Trust only, and is handled and stored in the same way as data submitted through the reporting pages on Badger Trust's website. 

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The app does not feed sensitive data like sett locations, or crime details, to any of the University of Exeter team or any other “interested parties”. It's been designed specifically so that it doesn't have a backend server, where such data would be stored, precisely with concerns around data security in mind. It is therefore not possible to “tap into” the data as no data is stored on the app. 
 

Why report badger crime to Badger Trust as well as the police?

Firstly, logging the crime via the app helps Badger Trust’s Wildlife Crime Officer, Craig Fellowes, to follow up on the crime report with the relevant police force, if necessary. Thus, the app has practical significance for the investigation of specific instances. The app helps users to correctly identify types of crime and to get the most accurate advice in real time.
 
Secondly, badger persecution is not a notifiable offence, which means that police are not required by law to record the number of crimes against badgers that are reported to them. Therefore, it falls to charities such as Badger Trust to create a national database of badger crime to prove that badger crime is an area of priority importance. 
 
Without a national picture of badger crime, we risk losing badger crime from the National Wildlife Crime Priority list. Under-reporting is a significant concern for badger protection, as without data to substantiate the severity of badger crime we risk losing the resources currently available to tackle badger persecution. 
 
The Badger Watch app will help badger group members and members of the public to recognise, record and report instances of badger crime so we can keep badger protection a national priority. 

 

What does Badger Trust do with the data?

Badger Trust uses the crime data to monitor the national picture of badger persecution. Each year, the crime data is collated by the number of instances of each crime (e.g. sett blocking, badger baiting, snaring) for use in the National Wildlife Crime Unit’s Annual Crime Report. 

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Without national statistics proving that crime is a significant threat to badgers, badger persecution will not remain listed as a UK wildlife crime priority. 

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Who designed the app?

The Badger Watch app has been designed in collaboration with researchers and developers from Exeter University, and members of the Devon and Somerset Badger Groups. Members from affiliated Badger Groups across England and Wales have assisted in the BETA testing.

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Dr Groling, who is lead on the app project, is a very active member of her local badger groups (Devon and Somerset Badger Groups). Dr Groling’s own video evidence has secured convictions against perpetrators of badger crime, and it was through her voluntary work with Badger Trust that Dr Groling realised there was a need for Badger Groups and the public to recognise, record, and report badger crime whilst out in the field.

 

The app has been developed by Chris Calvert (University of Exeter) and funded by a Research Impact Fund which seeks to support research which has real world applications. 

 

It has always been important to Badger Trust and the Exeter team that badger groups are part of the app development process, which is why Devon and Somerset groups were involved in the app’s initial design and why we asked all Badger Trust affiliated badger groups to test the app in its BETA version.

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Who is Badger Dynamics and what is Badger Trust's role with the app?

Badger Dynamics is a limited company through which developers from the University of Exeter have been managing the development of the app. The app itself is owned by Badger Trust, and it has been designed by badger group members and researchers from the University of Exeter