Apparently, police forces around the world are experiencing a personnel crunch. As they find themselves with less applicants from the younger Gens X and Y who are willing to join the force, some departments have had to develop unique strategies to reign in talent, according to ITBusiness.ca.

One such force, the Vancouver Police Department, under the leadership of the Web-savvy IT specialist Kevin McQuiggin, decided to stretch the recruiting boundaries by holding a recruitment seminar in Second Life. Said McQuiggin:

Tech-savvy police officers are key to the success of future investigations. As society changes, policing has to change as well. We’re going to have to have more officers that understand Facebook, YouTube, instant messaging and all these technologies because crime will naturally migrate to these environments, just like it has with things like fraud on the Internet.

As with almost every other industry on earth, the police force had to look forward to find new talent.

“We’re at a crossroads right now,” said Howard Chow, a recruiting sergeant with the VPD. “Old techniques and old ways of doing things aren’t working and we’ve got to look outside the box, and this is what the Second Life recruiting seminar is all about.”

And while only 30 people attended the event online (with four applicants, none of whom will likely be hired), the seminar was deemed a success, at least according to media interest:

“I was spokesperson for the VPD for three years, and that was one of the largest stories that I ever dealt with in terms of interest from the media. I was getting phone calls from reporters all over the world. It was huge,” said Chow.