A total of £23 million in grants has been allocated to improve policing through digital initiatives.
The Home Office awarded the money to 14 projects across nine forces and the College of Policing as part of the police transformation fund, which was set up as part of last year’s spending review.
The initiatives include £4m for Norfolk Constabulary to set up a national network to combat child sexual abuse and a further £973,000 for an associated image database.
It will also receive £1.1m to conduct a regional pilot for undercover resources to combat online child sexual exploitation.
Other funds were allocated to collaborative procurement and integrated systems projects.
The fund is run by the Police Reform and Transformation Board with the final decision made by the Home Office.
In total £76.4m is available for police transformation projects in 2016/17, including £34m already allocated to enhance armed policing capability, £4.6m for digital programmes and £3m for a programme that will consider how best to organise specialist police capabilities such as armed and roads policing.
New home secretary Amber Rudd said that reforming police services “must continue” and that she expects all forces across England and Wales to benefit from the projects.
She said: “The police transformation fund is incentivising policing to meet future challenges, and I am delighted by the strong early response to the launch of the fund from police and crime commissioners and chief constables.
“It is clear that they share my passion and determination to finish the job of police reform.”
The successful bids also came from West Yorkshire Police, Nottinghamshire Police in collaboration with Leicestershire and Northamptonshire, and Hampshire Constabulary, in collaboration with Surrey, Sussex and Thames Valley.