Data sources and recency
Where the data comes from
The platform aggregates 25,000+ global sources across 5,000+ cities.
| Source type | What it feeds |
|---|---|
| Law enforcement | Local police departments, national police agencies, university police, 911 call data. Primary input for crime categories. |
| Government | National and local government feeds, open datasets. |
| News and media | Local and national outlets covering unrest, civil events, and public safety incidents. Primary input for unrest categories. |
| NGOs and non-profits | Organizations tracking civil unrest, conflict, and humanitarian events. |
| Social and open data | Social channels, open datasets, additional aggregated feeds. |
By default, all relevant sources for a given event type are active. You can narrow to specific source categories in the source filter.
To see what is contributing at a specific location, use the Data Source module in the analytic panel. This is especially useful internationally, where availability varies significantly by country.
How often data refreshes
The cadence is monthly crime updates, bi-weekly unrest indicators.
This is a trailing index, not a real-time feed
If your workflow requires same-day awareness of a developing incident, BaseScore is the wrong instrument. It is designed for assessment and trend analysis over weeks and months, not operational alerting. Teams needing real-time incident awareness typically pair the platform with a dedicated alerting service.
Data quality
Accuracy reflects the quality of the underlying source data, which varies by jurisdiction. Law enforcement sources are generally high quality, subject to each department's reporting practices and classification standards. Some jurisdictions report promptly and consistently; others have delays, gaps, or inconsistent categorization.
Quality controls applied across all ingested data:
- Source verification
- Duplicate removal
- Anomaly detection
- Geocoding validation
No crime data system eliminates all errors. What the platform does offer is transparency about where data comes from, so you can make an informed judgment about reliability for your specific geography — and a fast path to report anything that looks wrong.
Geocoding precision
Incidents geocode at the precision of the source report, which determines whether they appear on the map:
| Granularity | In counts and analytics | On the heat map |
|---|---|---|
| Street level | Yes | Yes |
| Intersection | Yes | Yes |
| City / district level | Yes | No |
The Granularity column in the events list tells you which applies to each event. This is the most common explanation for a location showing event counts alongside a blank heat map, particularly in international cities.