Disclosed is a method of identifying a network of actors or people within a data set. The method has the steps of importing data from several data sources, normalising the data in the fields to create a merged consolidated data set, identifying one or more networks based on identical or similar instances of one or more pieces of data in the consolidated data set, and calculating a measure of influence of the actors in an identified network. The networks may be identified by the use of key words, number matching, an ontology based extraction or words or concepts, pictures, video, media, an identifying number or characteristic and/or data in an entry. The data may be telecommunications data including mobile phones. The networks may be analysed using social mapping techniques to identify the key actors and the links. The data sources may be police and government databases and the method used to identify criminal activity and their networks.
Consolidating data sets to identify networks of people and the influence of the individual actors in the network over the network.