Perplexity has launched Perplexity for Public Safety, giving eligible law‑enforcement and public‑safety organisations free access to Enterprise Pro for up to 200 seats over 12 months. Beyond the headline, the move signals a push into government and regulated workflows, from the street to the courtroom. Here’s what buyers need to know, and how to approach deployment responsibly.

Why this matters now

Public‑safety teams are under pressure to do more with less—making fast, defensible decisions while navigating data sprawl, disclosure rules, and public scrutiny. General‑purpose AI tools are surging, but most public bodies need stronger guarantees around privacy, auditability, and provenance. An enterprise offer tuned to law enforcement could reduce entry friction—if it meets governance standards and real‑world workflows.

What’s included in the programme

• Enterprise Pro access for up to 200 users for 12 months (discounts beyond that for larger rollouts).

• Mobile‑ready experience to support officers on patrol, at scenes, or in HQ.

• Access to leading models with enterprise controls, role‑based access, and security settings suited to sensitive work.

• Use‑case coverage from rapid information triage and policy look‑ups to report drafting, disclosure checks, briefing preparation, and courtroom support.

Where it fits in the workflow

1. Incident response — Officers query procedures, legal thresholds, and risk factors; supervisors compile quick briefing packs.

2. Investigation support — Summarise long reports, create case timelines, or draft requests for information.

3. Case preparation — Produce document summaries, witness‑list overviews, and cross‑reference disclosure requirements.

4. Courtroom and post‑incident review — Generate structured summaries, identify gaps, and prepare learning reports.

Key evaluation criteria for UK/EU agencies

1) Data protection & lawful basis
Confirm your lawful basis for processing, complete a DPIA, and ensure data minimisation. Ask for retention periods, encryption at rest/in transit, regional data handling options, and admin controls for export, deletion, and audit logs.

2) Provenance & citations
Prefer answer modes with explicit source linking and time‑stamped references. Document how outputs are verified, kept with sources, and incorporated into case files to avoid “black‑box” evidence risks.

3) Hallucination and bias controls
Require red‑team testing evidence, evaluation metrics, and human‑in‑the‑loop policies. Create local prompt libraries for high‑risk tasks and implement two‑person review for any evidential artefacts.

4) Role‑based access & auditability
Map roles (frontline, investigators, prosecutors, analysts). Confirm per‑user logs, admin dashboards, SSO/SAML/OIDC, and least‑privilege defaults. Ensure event logs can be exported for auditing and FOI.

5) Procurement & onboarding
Align with existing frameworks (e.g., UK G‑Cloud or local frameworks where applicable). Pilot with non‑sensitive data, monitor success metrics, then expand to higher‑stakes workflows.

Getting value in the 12‑month window

• Start with high‑impact, low‑risk tasks: policy look‑ups, summarisation of public documents, meeting briefs, and training aids.

• Create a governance playbook: DPIA template, acceptable‑use policy, prompt guidelines, and escalation paths.

• Instrument outcomes: track time saved, error rates, and user satisfaction; capture case studies for business cases.

• Plan for year two: understand discounted pricing, licence tiers, and any add‑ons; evaluate build‑vs‑buy for niche needs.

Security and compliance checkpoints

• Enterprise security posture: look for SOC 2/ISO 27001, secure SDLC, and vulnerability management.

• Data boundaries: confirm whether prompts/content are excluded from model training; check regional hosting and data‑at‑rest options.

• Access management: SSO, SCIM, RBAC, conditional access, device posture checks.

• Content handling: clear guidance on using synthetic outputs in case files, disclosure notes, and change‑tracking.

Risks and mitigations

• Misinformation & outdated content: enforce source‑required modes; embed verification steps in SOPs.

• Over‑reliance on AI: maintain human review for legal thresholds and charging decisions; treat outputs as drafts or leads.

• Privacy breaches: prohibit entry of PII without risk assessment; use secure redaction; restrict paste‑in of sensitive evidence.

• Public trust: be transparent about pilots, publish evaluation criteria, and brief oversight bodies early.

Competitive and ecosystem notes

AI for public safety is filling in across search/answer engines, copilots, and case‑management integrations. Expect procurement teams to compare Perplexity with incumbent legal‑research tools, document‑management systems, and integrated CJIS‑style platforms. The differentiator here is fast entry (no/low cost for a year) with answer‑engine UX and source linking—attractive for teams wanting immediate productivity but not a heavy platform swap.

Implementation roadmap (suggested)

Month 0–1: Foundation

• Nominate a cross‑functional squad (ops, legal, DPO, IT security).

• Approve DPIA and acceptable‑use policy; set up SSO, RBAC, logging.

• Create a “safe prompts” library for non‑sensitive tasks.

Month 2–3: Pilot

• 50–100 users across frontline and investigations; evaluate 3–5 priority use cases.

• KPI baseline: time to brief, report‑draft time, user satisfaction.

Month 4–6: Scale

• Expand to 200 seats; integrate with knowledge bases; establish red‑team tests.

• Introduce QA gates for any outputs used in court‑bound documents.

Month 7–12: Institutionalise

• Finalise funding plan for year two; document benefits; publish transparency note; train new joiners.

UK/EU localisation watch‑outs

• GDPR & policing exemptions: confirm lawful basis; narrow prompts; apply retention and deletion controls.

• Disclosure & FOI: keep sources with outputs; log prompts/responses; flag generative content in records.

• Open‑source intelligence (OSINT): ensure provenance and fair‑use; avoid scraping policies violations.

• Vendor due diligence: confirm corporate posture amidst ongoing IP/trademark disputes in the AI sector; maintain multi‑vendor options to reduce dependency risk.

Bottom line

Perplexity’s public‑safety push lowers the barrier for AI adoption in policing—but value depends on governance discipline and fit with existing workflows. With a structured pilot, clear safeguards, and measurement, agencies can extract productivity gains while maintaining legal defensibility and public trust.

Next Step: Want help designing a safe, standards‑aligned pilot? Contact Generation Digital’s AI governance and enablement team using the form below.

FAQ

Q1. Who is eligible for Perplexity for Public Safety?
A. Law‑enforcement and public‑safety agencies that meet vendor criteria. The programme provides up to 200 Enterprise Pro seats free for 12 months.

Q2. Can we use it on mobile devices for frontline work?
A. Yes. The enterprise experience is mobile‑optimised for patrol, incident scenes, and HQ use.

Q3. Are our prompts and documents used to train models?
A. Use enterprise settings that exclude customer content from model training. Confirm this in your contract and admin controls.

Q4. What happens after the free year?
A. Discounted plans are available for larger deployments. Build a year‑two business case with tracked benefits and risk assessments.

Q5. Is it suitable for evidential use?
A. Treat outputs as drafts or leads. Maintain human review, preserve source links, and record verification steps before inclusion in case files.