Being the Coordinator of the European project TESSERA, the M4D group together with the Visual Computing Lab (VCL), both groups of CERTH-ITI, hosted the kick-off meeting of the project which is entitled “TESSERA – Towards thE dataSetS for the European SEcurRity DAta Space for Innovation”. The meeting took place on March 6 and 7, 2024, at CERTH’s premises in Thessaloniki, Greece.
TESSERA is a two-year project, funded by the European Union within the framework of the Internal Security Fund project grants and aims to conduct the preparatory work for the creation of high-quality large-scale trusted and shareable datasets based on identified operational use cases supporting the European Security Data Space for Innovation. The project also aims to specify the low-level architecture of the data-related national components of the European Security Data Space, foster the involvement of stakeholders, organise technical workshops, and produce a report documenting its outcomes.
In particular, TESSERA will pave the path for the creation and evaluation of findable, accessible, interoperable, re-usable, and shareable datasets and/or data models in all modalities of interest for training, testing, and validating innovative tools and algorithms in the field of security taking into consideration relevant existing and emerging regulation. This will have significant impact, as it is an essential precondition for the development of high-quality trustworthy and transparent AI solutions for law enforcement that are subject to fundamental rights safeguards and adhere to the principles of human autonomy, prevention of harm, fairness, and explicability. TESSERA’s target groups involve Law Enforcement Agencies and relevant stakeholders (e.g., relevant EU Agencies, AI technology providers from academia, research, and industry, policy makers, security domain experts and practitioners) from the EU Member States with a particular interest in European Security Data Space for Innovation and the use of datasets for disruptive technologies in the security domain.
TESSERA engages seven partners from three countries, from both research and academic institutions, technology-oriented companies, as well as Law Enforcement Agencies, with strong experience and expertise in the security domain and AI technologies, as well as on relevant legal and ethical issues, thus promoting a multidisciplinary approach.
The kick-off meeting was also attended by the European Commission Project Officer who underlined the need for continuous collaboration and a multidisciplinary approach to effectively cover and promote all aspects governing the creation of high quality datasets for the European Security Data Space, whereas it also hosted a presentation of the popAI project summarising its results in terms of policy recommendations, best practices, ethical aspects, and foresighting regarding the use of AI in civil security.