Editorial and automated publishing policy
The controls that prevent a useful data service from becoming a factory for thin, sensational or search-first pages.
A publishable report needs at least 3 substantive sections, 1 primary legal or statistical source and 1 independent source when an incident claim needs outside verification.
Before anything is published
The publication gate checks purpose and evidence
An imported article needs a descriptive title and matching H1, a direct contextual link to the relevant map view, and sources that support its claims. It must also pass checks for useful link text, sufficient depth and duplicate URLs.
Automation cannot make a weak draft accurate
The importer cleans unsafe markup and spaces eligible reports at least three days apart. Failed work stays private until an editor repairs or rejects it.
Safeguards for crime reporting
Five claims the site will not make
- No claim that an approximate point identifies an address.
- No naming a suspect as guilty before conviction.
- No invented victim detail, eyewitness account, motive or legal conclusion.
- No graphic imagery, fear-based copy or unsupported “dangerous area” label.
- No penalty claim without a current primary or Sentencing Council source.
News links need incident-level verification
A monitor may find a report with the same offence term, area, approximate street label and source month as a map record. That creates a private lead, not a public match. An editor must read the report and confirm that it covers the same incident. Ambiguous matches are rejected.
What makes a page worth indexing
Original value must be visible
A page must add analysis, a calculation, a comparison, a clear method, a checked timeline or an interactive tool. Swapping a place name or keyword does not create a useful new page.
Imported work needs a recorded human decision
Third-party drafts remain absent from the report archive, internal search and XML sitemap until an editor records who reviewed the work and what original value CrimeRate added. Exact-content duplicates are blocked. A publish date or an automated quality score cannot grant indexing by itself.
Links must explain their destination
Only a specific title or action phrase is linked. A whole descriptive card is not wrapped in one link because that creates noisy link text for search engines and screen readers.
Publishing and indexing are separate decisions
Passing the content gate does not make a page indexable. Public pages also need a clear purpose, enough coverage, distinct value, accurate sources and editorial ownership. Internal search, APIs, filtered duplicates, individual records and incomplete reports remain excluded. The technical methodology explains how those rules are applied to routes and datasets.