"Our vision is to take a leadership role in information sharing solutions for police departments around the country - and there are nine different, disparate systems - because information is the lifeblood in the fight against organized crime," McDevitt said.

CrimTrac is now processing 175,000 NPRS transactions per day from a user base of some 50,000 people around the country.

"We also have a number of other agencies that have applied for access to the system," he said. "It could be related to youth suicide, border security, or for any stakeholder that needs access to critical information and we are working through these individually."

McDevitt described CrimTrac as an "active" information system whereas previous information systems were "backend" systems.

With nearly 9 million records and 2.2 million photos the NPRS and can be accessed on police desktops, car terminals or portable device to obtain a nationwide view of persons of interest and police can "stay on the beat".