Security – Multimodal Data Fusion and Analytics Group

KOBAN

KOBAN Identifying future capabilities for Community Policing Across Europe society is changing due to demographic, technological and economic developments. Communities are getting more diverse, both in real life and online. This challenges Law Enforcement Agencies (LEAs) to engage with, and to reassure, communities about safety and security matters in a trustful way. The changing status quo is significantly shaping perceptions of policing, requiring adaptive strategies. To address these challenges, the KOBAN project will create an innovative, research and practice-based Community Policing (CP) initiative, adopting an evidence-based approach. It will focus on co-creation and collaborative security between LEA and non-LEA community members, leading to mutual trust and respecting each other’s contributions. This results in a greater sense of security, whilst contributing to an overall increase in the efficiency and effectiveness of…

SAFEGUARD

SAFEGUARD SAFEguardinG pUblic spAces through intelligent thReat Detection tools SAFEGUARD aims at developing a next-generation holistic suite of tools that significantly improve LEA capabilities to protect public spaces against terrorist attacks through the entire lifecycle of their operations. To this end, SAFEGUARD leverages the successful outcomes of EU-funded projects (S4AllCities, CONNEXIONs, CREST, PREVISION, PRAETORIAN), providing a complete and powerful framework for intelligent threat detection relevant to the context of safety of public spaces. The outcomes of the project will result in the improvement of public spaces, such as malls, open crowded areas and events by deploying tools and technologies for acquiring intelligence regarding terrorist attacks and supporting LEA operations in an efficient and effective manner. Moreover, SAFEGUARD aspires to develop knowledge on the potential use of AI techniques and algorithms…

ENSEMBLE

ENSEMBLE ENhanced AI-baSEd cybercriMe-oriented collaBorative investigation technologies and capabiLitiEs ENSEMBLE aims to enhance the capabilities of multiple stakeholders involved in (cross-border) joint cybercrime-oriented investigations by developing (i) a modular AI-based forensically sound investigation ToolBox to assist LEAs in fighting sophisticated cyber-threats and cybercrimes, (ii) relevant training material for Police Authorities, prosecutors, and judicial actors involved in such investigations, and (iii) appropriate public awareness campaigns for early identification and prevention of cybercrimes. M4D is responsible for the coordination of the ENSEMBLE project and is also tasked with its Scientific and Technical management. M4D contains a critical role across the whole project as the leader of the Work Package that is responsible for the development of AI-based tools that are used to enhance the decision support during investigations, the correlation of data…

Datacros III

Datacros III Developing an ethical AI-driven tool-box for boosting cross-border financial investigations on organised crime networks Through a combination of (i) data-driven tools, (ii) training, (iii) research and (iv) legal assessment, and building on the success of previous DATACROS actions, DATACROS III will further boost the capacity of European Union Law Enforcement Agencies, Asset Recovery Offices, Financial Intellignce Units, Anti-corruption, competition authorities and journalists to investigate transnational Organized Crime networks and their business models across a wider variety of financial domains and criminal assets. It will: 1.Expand the current DATACROS data-ecosystem with new sources which will allow tracing Organized Crime in (a)cross-border corporate structures, (b)public procurement and funds, (c)virtual currencies/assets, (d)bank accounts/transactions, (e)real estate and vehicles in 200+countries (Work Package 1); 2.Implement new AI-driven functions for (a) better detection of…

CARMA

CARMA Collaborative Autonomous Robots for eMergency Assistance CARMA aims to co-create, through a user-centred iterative methodology involving a complementary set of end-users and social sciences and human (SSH) experts, a groundbreaking, modular and intuitive platform offering a complementary set of semi-autonomous and autonomous Unmanned Ground Vehicles (UGVs) capable of working in symbiosis with humans to support and supplement first responders and assist citizen in a wide range of disaster situations, including those with very low visibility. The project will build on the most advanced research results, including those from the INTREPID project, in the field of disaster robotics making them autonomous thanks to novel 3D radar-based environment mapping and analysis combined with Artificial Intelligence (AI) for enhanced path and mission planning as well as victim and threat detection. Symbiotic operations…

TESSERA

TESSERA Towards thE dataSetS for the European secuRity dAta space for innovation The European Security Data Space for Innovation (EU SDSI) has been recognized as the cornerstone for implementing the European Data Strategy in the security domain, aiming at Europe’s data sovereignty, while having as ultimate goal to increase trust in the use of Artificial Intelligence by Law Enforcement. In this context, TESSERA aims to conduct the preparatory work for the creation of high-quality large-scale trusted and shareable datasets based on identified operational use cases, thus supporting the European Security Data Space for Innovation. Particular focus will be given on analyzing and defining the requirements ensuring the interoperability and shareability of heterogeneous datasets, whilst considering their compliance to privacy preservation and protection of fundamental human rights. TESSERA also aims to…

ENACT

ENACT European Network Against Crime and Terrorism The programming of Security R&I is a highly sensitive exercise, which has grown in complexity during the past years. Moreover, the uptake of innovation stemming from EU-funded security R&I projects remains a challenge. The goal of ENACT is to set up a Knowledge Network for Security R&I in the Fighting Crime and Terrorism area capable of i) supporting the EU-funded FCT security R&I cycle and the overall community and market actors with actionable evidence, and ii) boosting the Innovation Uptake of the outcomes and results stemming from FCT Security funded R&I projects. ENACT brings together the most unique blend of knowledge, background, skills, resources and connections to: i) deliver a network-enabling service that facilitates the exchange of knowledge and value within the wider…

TeamUP

TeamUP Holistic Capability and Technology Evaluation and Co-creation Framework for Upskilled First Responders and Enhanced CBRN-E Response Countries worldwide, amid threats and incidents targeting civilians, invest in reinforcing their CBRN-E related capabilities. In Europe and in most cases, the teams responding first are not trained specifically, nor equipped sufficiently to face the kind of hazards, to provide assistance to victims and to follow the decontamination processes that a CBRN-E incident implies. At the same time, resources are limited, exercises and trainings are siloed per organization, lacking of proven procedures, and digital tools. A step-by-step approach needs to include (1) detection of the CBRN-E threat, (2) triage of casualties and (3) on-site decontamination before the provision of medical aid. TeamUP addresses these challenges by developing an innovative toolkit for the detection,…

REACTION

REACTION REal-time ArtifiCial InTellIgence for BOrders Surveillance via RPAS data aNalytics to support Law Enforcement Agencies During the past decade, Greece and Cyprus, being both part of the external EU borders, have been called to address major challenges associated with the socio-political situation in their surrounding territories and adjacent countries. In particular, irregular migration flows exert significant pressure on the relevant authorities and agencies that operate at respective border territories. Moreover, armed conflicts, changes in climate conditions, and unpredictable factors occurring at the EU external borders, have increased the number of reported transnational crimes including irregular migration. Smuggling, human trafficking, and irregular migration activities are major concerns for South Eastern EU Borders particularly, as monitoring the routes used is hindered by vast sea and mountainous, densely forested areas and rough…

ACTING

ACTING Advanced European platform and network of Cybersecurity training and exercises centres The ACTING project delivers an organized and coordinated approach to proactively improve efficiency of cyber defence training and exercises in the European Union, through effective and efficient multi-sector collaboration. The 28 Partners, from 13 MSs, will execute a 48-month work plan to develop, model, and demonstrate a network of advanced interconnected (federated) domain-oriented cyber ranges for training and exercises, incorporating sophisticated methods and techniques for simulation of users, analysis of the performance of the cyber operators, and scoring cyber security situational awareness, supported by leading-edge scenario development language. The ACTING project integrates study, design, prototyping, and testing activities in the domain of cyber security. In order to justify the capabilities of the proposed approach and resulting tools and…

ARIEN

ARIEN ARtificial IntelligencE in fighting illicit drugs production and traffickiNg ARIEN proposes the execution of a comprehensive workplan that thoroughly addresses the call topic aligned to the 2021-2025 EU Drugs Action Plan achieved through a holistic innovation action that builds a real-time intelligence picture for illegal drug production and trafficking incidence across the EU. This action is bolstered by AI-driven tools to understand, detect, analyse and track the entire drugs trafficking chain, its financial flows and the role of black-markets in the global darknet and their relationships with social media. ARIEN builds on a strong platform of multi-disciplinary research, following a co-creation approach, across the criminological, societal, and legislative landscapes. The designed platform will make recommendations for harmonization and drive an agenda for the development of modular solutions embedding modern…

VANGUARD

VANGUARD adVANced technoloGical solutions coupled with societal-oriented Understanding and AwaReness for Disrupting trafficking in human beings VANGUARD aims to strengthen the fight against trafficking in human beings (THB) at the nexus of advanced technological solutions, understanding, awareness raising, and training to disrupt the trafficking chain at an early stage and address the culture of impunity. It aims to provide an improved intelligence picture of THB, with particular focus on THB for purposes of sexual exploitation, labour exploitation, and forced criminality. This will be achieved through developing a modular and trustworthy suite of tools for detecting, identifying, investigating, and preventing online-facilitated THB activities and THB-related activities at (border) checkpoints based on the analysis of online multimedia content and multimodal streams, by leveraging the latest advancements in Artificial Intelligence (AI). It will…

NANCY

NANCY An Artificial Intelligent Aided Unified Network for Secure Beyond 5G Long Term Evolution The overall aim of NANCY is to introduce a secure and intelligent architecture for the beyond the fifth generation (B5G) wireless network. Leveraging AI and blockchain, NANCY enables secure and intelligent resource management, flexible networking, and orchestration. In this direction, novel architectures, namely point-to-point (P2P) connectivity for device-to-device connectivity, mesh networking, and relay-based communications, as well as protocols for medium access, mobility management, and resource allocation will be designed. These architectures and protocols will make the most by jointly optimizing the midhaul, and fronthaul. This is expected to enable truly distributed intelligence and transform the network to a low-power computer. Likewise, by following a holistic optimization approach and leveraging the developments in blockchain, NANCY aims at…

FALCON

FALCON Fight Against Large-scale Corruption and Organised Crime Networks Current evidence suggests that the global fight against corruption faces serious challenges: policy decisions are not well informed, the corruption landscape is complex and enormous, while measuring corruption is so far mostly based on subjective approaches, and there is lack of appropriate technological tools to support anti-corruption. To address these challenges, FALCON is designed and dedicated to support the composition, update and management of comprehensive corruption intelligence pictures, within domains and jurisdictions of interest. This will be accomplished following a multi-actor, evidence-based, data-driven approach, building upon existing assets and prior work of consortium partners. FALCON will, first, develop and validate objective and actionable indicators of corruption that can be used to inform policy decisions. Second, it will design, implement and integrate…

TESTUDO

TESTUDO Autonomous Swarm of Heterogeneous resources in infrastructure protection via threat prediction and prevention As its surroundings changes radically and climate conditions deteriorates, Europe and its Members adapt to these current challenges. To this end and in order to maximise their usability, the EC established a framework of a common policy (EU Security Market study) by categorizing potential technologies per security domain, including Critical Infrastructure (CI) Protection. This trend is indicative for the importance and significancy that the EC gives to these matters. Any potential disruption, either intentional as a terrorist attack or a natural disaster, may risk smooth operations of such structures that may have a severe impact on a local society and its daily activities or well-being. Current advancements in various technologies can be particularly beneficial in CI…

SYNERGISE

SYNERGISE A novel integrated SYstem of Systems streNgthening tEchnical and logistical capacities to ensure better Response to emerGencies by synergIStically addrEssing FRs capability gaps The SYNERGISE project aims at boosting the efficiency and safety of first responders during life-saving missions. The SYNERGISE team will develop a Novel Integrated Toolkit for Collaborative Response and Enhanced Situational Awareness (NIT-CRES). The toolkit shall improve the management of natural and man-made disasters whilst boosting collaboration between first responders to increase mission effectiveness and victim detection at highly challenging and complex incident sites. This will comprise a multitude of tools and services required for: 1) boosting situational awareness and sense-making by offering them the means to autonomously and synergistically perform indoor and outdoor exploration of incident sites towards victim identification whilst receiving at all times…

CONNECTOR

CONNECTOR CustOms exteNded iNteroperablE Common informaTiOn shaRing environment CONNECTOR aims to support the European Integrated Border Management (EIBM) and the EU Customs Action Plan by emphasising the importance of collaborative efforts among Customs, Border and Coast Guard Authorities in managing borders, especially under current and future challenging circumstances. This objective can be achieved through Customs participation in the Common Information Sharing Environment (CISE) network and Enhanced Common Information Sharing Environment (e-CISE) via the proposed Customs Extended Common Information Sharing Environment (CE-CISE). CONNECTOR proposes an integrated, common, and shared risk assessment approach for all Border Management Authorities. This approach considers pan-EU common risk indicators for each end user group, including Customs, Border and Coast Guards Authorities, as well as FRONTEX. Its aim is to safeguard the external EU border, protect EU…

PRECRISIS

PRECRISIS PRotECting public spaces thRough Integrated Smarter Innovative Security PRECRISIS aims to strengthen the protection of public spaces by preventing terrorist attacks and violent crimes and mitigating their impacts. It will promote integrated smarter innovative security through the empowerment of law enforcement authorities, first responders, local managers of public spaces and related security stakeholders, enhancing public-private cooperation. PRECRISIS will develop, test, and roll out innovative, sustainable, and effective AI-based digital solutions and practical toolkits, in full compliance with ethical standards and related legislation on the protection of personal data, by integrating existing expertise, best practices and privacy-by-design approaches to make public spaces more secure. Technological innovation delivered by the PRECRISIS Platform will provide identification of potential vulnerabilities connected to public spaces and a real-time simulation of plausible scenarios before, during…

EMPOWER

EMPOWER Uptake of new generation AI Powered Investigative tools for LEAs The application of AI methods to Big Data heralds a new era in Law Enforcement, increasing the operational capabilities of Law Enforcement Agencies (LEAs) in fighting and predicting crime. Promising tech solutions and tools are being developed within the framework of EU and nationally funded R&I projects reaching TRL 6-7 and applicable to a wide number of investigative fields. Building up from such previous and ongoing R&I projects (AIDA, DANTE, GRACE, STARLIGHT), the overall goal of EMPOWER is to foster the uptake of innovative solutions based upon AI powered tools allowing LEAs to increase their capabilities in such investigative fields. To this end, EMPOWER will pilot test a total of 8 investigative tools in the fields of Image/Video, Voice/Text…

ALLIES

ALLIES AI-based framework for supporting micro (and small) HSPs on the report and removaL of onLIne tErroriSt content The ALLIES project aims at supporting micro (and small) HSPs in achieving compliance with the new requirements and obligations under the TCO Regulation. To achieve this, ALLIES adopts four main approaches, each targeting skill development and innovation. These four pillars will be respectively focused on (1) learning and awareness raising, (2) technical development and adaptation, (3) training and education, and (4) experience sharing and reporting mechanisms. Both the learning and awareness raising initiatives will further expand the capacity of the TCO Regulation by designing a taxonomy of online terrorist related behaviours. The second pillar will be focused on the development of a specific set of AI-boosted user-friendly tools that will enhance small…

CESAGRAM

CESAGRAM Towards a Comprehensive European Strategy Against tech-facilitated GRooming And Missing Child sexual abuse online is a growing phenomenon. The British National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (NSPCC) reported a 70% increase in the number of sexual communications with child offences in the last three years. The hotlines for missing children have reported concerns that grooming is an increasing factor in disappearances, particularly in cases of children who run away. In 2020, the second most common reason for children to contact Child Helplines was for reasons of violence of which 3,2% was online sexual abuse. Disappointingly, the COVID pandemic has exacerbated the problem. The COVID-19 crisis pushed 1.2 billion children out of schools, leading to children spending many more hours online. As Europol emphasised in its 2021…

PERIVALLON

PERIVALLON Protecting the EuRopean terrItory from organised enVironmentAl crime through inteLLigent threat detectiON tools PERIVALLON aims to provide an improved and comprehensive intelligence picture of organised environmental crime and develop effective and efficient tools and solutions for detecting and preventing such types of criminal activities and for assessing their environmental impact based on geospatial intelligence, remote sensing, scanning, online monitoring, analysis, correlation, risk assessment, and predictive analytics technologies, by leveraging the latest advancements in Artificial Intelligence (AI) in the fields of computer vision and multimodal analytics. As a result, enhanced investigation processes and methodologies will be derived through the capabilities provided by the developed tools and solutions, and the insights obtained though the proposed Environmental Crime Observatory. The capacity of end users (including Police Authorities and Border Guards) will also…

DYNAMO

DYNAMO Dynamic Resilience Assessment Method including combined Business Continuity Management and Cyber Threat Intelligence solution for Critical Sectors The scope of DYNAMO is to combine the two fields of business continuity management (BCM) and cyber threat intelligence (CTI) to generate a situational awareness picture for decision support across all stages of the resilience cycle (prepare, prevent, protect, response, recover). Professionals of different backgrounds will work together with end-users to develop, refine and combine selected tools into a single platform. In alignment to end-user needs, human factors, high ethical standards and societal impacts, DYNAMO includes the following goals: Resilience assessment as basis for BCM - An assessment with different levels of detail offers with varying existent data a fast or detailed evaluation of the investigated sector and helps to identify critical…

MultiRATE

MultiRATE Holistic framework for the MatUrity evaLuaTIon of ReAdiness level for security TEchnologies In recent years, there are plenty of metrics that try to evaluate the maturity of products/systems/processes when identifying their deployment readiness. Even though a significant effort has been made to integrate such widely used frameworks, methodologies and indicators in products/systems/processes, their usage by EU funded security R&I projects has been limited. As a result, a robust scaling framework is more than of utmost importance. The proposed MultiRATE scaling framework will rely on existing established readiness level approaches and will formally combine them into one acceptable and reliable framework. MultiRATE will be able to evaluate and apply the readiness of all aspects of products/systems/processes. It will make a thorough research on the existing methodologies and will develop a…

LAGO

LAGO LESSEN DATA ACCESS AND GOVERNANCE OBSTACLES LAGO will deliver the foundation for a trusted EU FTC Research Data Ecosystem (RDE) to address the so-called “Data Issue” in the FCT research landscape, i.e., the lack of domain-specific data in sufficient quality and quantity to enable appropriate training and testing of the developed methods, platforms and tools. LAGO will be instrumental in identifying common barriers and subsequently providing the structural, governance and technical foundations to foster and innovate data-oriented research collaboration among LEAs, security practitioners, relevant EU agencies, academic and industry researchers, policy makers and regulators. For this purpose,LAGO will develop an evidence-based and validated multi-actor Reference Architecture for the FCT RDE for these actors to deposit, share and co-create data and tools for FCT research purposes based on common rules,…

ENCRYPT

ENCRYPT A scalable and practical privacy-preserving framework The deluge of big data, accompanied by developments in software and hardware technologies leveraging them, has created new opportunities for research and industry. The main challenges, though, faced by researchers and service providers working with personal data, are stemming from the fact that these data need to be processed in a privacy-preserving way, as they contain sensitive information. Although several technologies have been developed to facilitate the processing of data while preserving privacy, they have not made significant inroads into real use cases, due to several reasons. ENCRYPT will develop a scalable, practical, adaptable privacy preserving framework, allowing researchers and developers to process data stored in federated cross-border data spaces in a GDPR compliant way. Within this framework, a recommendation engine for citizens…

CTC

CTC Cut The Cord With the nature of terror incidents undergoing a technology-aided transformation (e.g. use of cryptocurrencies to enhance anonymity), the monitoring and analysis of financial transactions play a pivotal role in the effort to timely prevent actions and funding of global terrorism. Financial crime exploits every aspect of digital transformation and identifies non-traditional products for financing and supporting terrorist organisations, such as social media, cryptocurrencies, and other Financial Technologies. The prevention and disruption of terrorism financing requires international cooperation and advanced investigative techniques based on new technologies. The CTC project (Cut The Cord) aims to enhance the public-private cooperation through the establishment of a wide stakeholder community, with the vision to sustain it beyond the end of the project. Joint training exercises (theoretical and hands-on) will be organised…

TREEADS

TREEADS A Holistic Fire Management Ecosystem for Prevention, Detection and Restoration of Environmental Disasters TREEADS aims to build upon state-of-the-art products and unite them in a holistic Fire Management platform that optimizes and reuses the available socio-technological resources in all three main phases of wildfire management. For the Prevention and Preparedness phases, TREEADS proposes the use of a real-time risk evaluation tool that receives multiple classification inputs and works with a newly proposed neural network-powered risk factor indicator. To create a model of Fire Adapted Communities (FAC), in parallel to insurance incentives, TREEADS will use Alkali-Activated Materials (AAM), integrating Post-wildfire Wood Ashes (PWA) for fire-resilient buildings and infrastructure. TREEADS also uses a variety of technological solutions such as the Copernicus infrastructure, and a swarm of small drones customized for accurate…

DRIC-Defkalion

DRIC-Defkalion Innovative Partnership for the Protection and Safety of Environmental Risks The Disaster Resilience Innovation Cluster – Defkalion (DRIC Defkalion) is the first coordinated, interdisciplinary and innovative collaborative action in Greece in the critical field of protection against environmental risks. DRIC Defkalion aims to bring together under the same umbrella businesses, research organizations and technology companies active in the field of Environmental Protection and Sustainable Development to market innovative products and services, as well as research results with the ultimate goal to effectively manage and deal with natural disasters, environmental crises and civil protection emergencies for a healthy and safe environment and to achieve long-term sustainability. DRIC Defkalion focuses its interests on the following Areas of Activity: Atmospheric Modeling, Meteorological and Ocean Forecasts and Climate Change Scenarios Earth Observation, GIS…

Nestor

NESTOR NESTOR – aN Enhanced pre-frontier intelligence picture to Safeguard The EurOpean boRders NESTOR aims to demonstrate a fully functional next generation holistic border surveillance system providing pre-frontier situational awareness beyond maritime and land border following the concept of the European Integrated Border Management. NESTOR long-range, wide area surveillance capabilities for detection, recognition classification and tracking of moving targets (e.g. persons, vehicles, drones etc.) is based on optical, thermal imagine and Radio Frequency (RF) spectrum analysis fed by an interoperable long range IP-based network of sensors including stationary installations and mobile manned or unmanned aerial, water surface, underwater and ground vehicles, capable of functioning both as standalone, tethered and in swarms (UAV, USV, UUV and UGV) platforms. NESTOR Border Command Control and Coordination intelligence (BC3i) system using cutting-edge Artificial Intelligence…

ODYSSEUS

ODYSSEUS Preventing, Countering and Investigation Terrorist Attacks Through Prognostic, Detection and Forensic Mechanisms for Explosive Precursors ODYSSEUS aims to increase the knowledge on homemade explosives (HMEs) and explosive precursors, including precursors not previously studied, and develop effective and efficient prognostic, detection, and forensic tools to improve the capabilities of Law Enforcement Agencies (LEAs) towards the prevention, countering, and investigation of terrorist incidents involving HMEs. ODYSSEUS will build upon relevant previous projects mainly HOMER, through the involvement of HOMER’s core partners in this consortium, and will thus continue the work already performed in HOMER on some precursors and also further extend it to not previously studied precursors. To discover potentially hitherto unknown information, online HMEs recipes will be collected and their content will be analysed in order to extract knowledge about…

SECANT

SECANT SECurity And privacy protectioN in Internet of Things devices SECANT aims to contribute decisively towards improving the readiness and resilience of organisations against the crippling modern cyber-threats, by increasing the privacy, data protection, and accountability across the entire interconnected ICT ecosystem, and by reducing the costs for security training in the European market. To this end, the SECANT platform will enhance the capabilities of organisations’ stakeholders, by implementing (a) collaborative threat intelligence collection, analysis, and sharing; (b) innovative risk analysis specifically designed for interconnected nodes of an industrial ecosystem; (c) cutting-edge trust and accountability mechanisms for data protection, and (d) security awareness training for more informed security choices. The effectiveness and versatility of the proposed solution will be validated in four realistic pilot use case scenarios applied in the…

Nightingale

Nightingale Novel InteGrated toolkit for enhanced pre-Hospital life support and Triage IN challenGing And Large Emergencies Major emergencies, crisis and disasters have become more frequent the last decades. However, nowadays, emergency medical services and non-medical civil protection practitioners in a mass casualty incident scene are often striving to save lives but they are relying on complicated or outdated procedures and technology of the past. Additionally, disasters might differ in nature, geographic extent and other parameters, leading, in such a way, in a multitude of challenges. Therefore, it is uppermost affected people to feel safe and to get top-level healthcare that modern technology and current civil protection systems can offer. Nightingale is aimed at upgrading pre-hospital life support and Triage by delivering enhanced Operational Capacity to respond to mass casualty incidents…

LAW-GAME

LAW-GAME An Interactive, Collaborative Digital Gamification Approach to Effective Experiential Training and Prediction of Criminal Actions Criminal incidents play an important role as a disturbance of European Unions’ welfare. Police forces face daily acts of crime, such as intentional homicide and assault, drug trafficking, human and illegal firearm trafficking, as well as other forms of illegal activities, associated with the presence of organized crime groups(OCGs) in the EU. It is very crucial to have trained security personnel with an orientation in detail and critical thinking. Skillful law enforcement officers are demanded to tackle effectively this type of incidents, who in most cases are not easily available. The improvement of law enforcement officers will increase both LEAs capabilities and effectiveness in the fight against crime and terrorism and protection of European…

STRONG

STRONG advanced firST RespONders training First responders play a crucial and integral role in today’s civil society. Among the plethora of services they provide, one may find law enforcement, firefighting and emergency medical services (EMS). In all three of the aforementioned services, time management could play an important role in order to assist first responders to reach their maximum potential and effectively and efficiently deal with the crisis. For instance, crime rates could significantly decrease if a police officer has the complete situational awareness picture to hinder criminals; fire fighters could be able to save more lives in less time from burning buildings and EMS could act in a proper and quick manner in order to treat medical conditions (such as cardiac arrests) that could result in death. The same…

xR4DRAMA

xR4DRAMA Extended Reality For DisasteR management And Media plAnning The EU-funded xR4DRAMA project aims to create a solution that will improve the situational awareness of those user groups who are responsible for handling disasters, man-made crises or public events. The groups range from first responders, local authorities and security forces to media companies and event planners. Situational awareness is crucial for them to execute tasks efficiently, plan things and take the appropriate decisions. The proof of concept of this project will focus on first responders and media companies before extending the use cases to other domains. xR4DRAMA's methodology is based on X Reality (XR) technologies, and the tool can be used remotely and on site for an augmented and shared perception of a given situation. In particular, innovative technologies will…

ISOLA

ISOLA A system platform that enhances the situational awareness and support Ship’s Security Stakeholders to the execution of their duties referring to the Ship's Security Plan Maritime transport enables trade and contacts between all EU nations and has always been a catalyst for economic development and prosperity of the Union. One of the major concerns of EU policy is to protect the citizens and economies from the consequences of unlawful intentional acts against shipping and port operations. ISOLA will develop, integrate, test, deploy, demonstrate and validate a systematic and fully automated security approach by incorporating innovative technologies for sensing, monitoring, data fusion, alarming and reporting real-time during illegal incidents. This will ensure high level of security among all passengers of the ship and augmentation of the Ship Security Plan. The…

7SHIELD

7SHIELD Prevention, detection, response and mitigation of combined physical and cyber threats to critical infrastructure in Europe The 7SHIELD project addresses the security and the resilience of EU Ground Segments of Space Systems, meeting the crosscutting and the sectorial criteria of the EU critical infrastructures (2008/14). The Copernicus era has created a new market with the massive amounts of satellite data that the ground segments of space systems receive serve to the market and governmental bodies. A physical/cyber-attack to their installations or communication networks, respectively, would cause debilitating impact on public safety and security of EU citizens and public authorities. A physical attack on a space ground segment makes the distribution of satellite data problematic and, on the other hand, a cyber-attack in its data storage, access and exchange affects…

SAFERS

SAFERS Enhancing our society's resilience against wildfires Forest fires are exacerbated by extreme weather conditions, which are increasing both in frequency and in magnitude due to climate change effects. This points to the need for improving the effectiveness of emergency management solutions aimed to help society in becoming more resilient to emergencies arising before, during and after forest fire events. Therefore, it is proposed to realize a comprehensive Emergency Management System (EMS) that we name SAFERS: Structured Approaches for Forest fire Emergencies in Resilient Societies. SAFERS will act along the key phases of the emergency management cycle, coupling information from EO data and services offered by Copernicus and GEOSS, crowdsourced data from social media and from specific applications that can be used by both citizens as well as from in-field…

AIDA

AIDA Artificial Intelligence and advanced Data Analytics for Law Enforcement Agencies The goal of AIDA is to provide Law Enforcement Agencies (LEAs) in the EU Member States (MS) with innovative, dedicated and sustainable digital technologies to facilitate the entire Big Data analytics cycle as part of their investigative and proactive prevention capabilities focused on cybercrime and counterterrorism. More specifically, AIDA will provide law enforcement across the EU with a modular capacity to acquire, (pre-)process, enrich, analyse and visualise multi-source Big Data in near real-time. The latter will shift the capacity of EU Member States to fight cybercrime and terrorism, while implementing governance procedures to maintain full compliance with fundamental rights and applicable legislation, including privacy and protection of personal data and ensure chain of custody. The AIDA framework will adapt…

PathoCERT

PathoCERT Pathogen Contamination Emergency Response Technologies Pathogens are a determining factor in emergency response due to their life-threatening nature, both for the public as well as for the safety of first responders. In many cases, pathogen contaminations are difficult to detect, and require specialized technologies, tools and procedures to handle them. Waterborne pathogen contamination events can occur anywhere, and may be caused by various natural events or they can be the result of human activity, either accidental or malicious. During these emergencies, first responders may need to operate within a certain pre-defined incident area, and are likely to be exposed to contaminated water originating from various sources, such as surface water, wastewater or drinking water. This can pose a significant risk of illness, disease or even death, through skin contact,…

TENSOR

TENSOR reTriEval and aNalysis of heterogeneouS online content for TerrOrist activity Recognition Law Enforcement Agencies (LEAs) across Europe face today important challenges in how they identify, gather and interpret terrorist generated content online. The Dark Web presents additional challenges due to its inaccessibility and the fact that undetected material can contribute to the advancement of terrorist violence and radicalisation. LEAs also face the challenge of extracting and summarising meaningful and relevant content hidden in huge amounts of online data to inform their resource deployment and investigations. In this context, the main objective of the TENSOR project is to provide a powerful terrorism intelligence platform offering LEAs fast and reliable planning and prevention functionalities for the early detection of terrorist organised activities, radicalisation and recruitment. The platform integrates a set of…

ROBORDER

ROBORDER Autonomous swarm of heterogenous robots for border surveillance Border authorities and Law Enforcement Agencies (LEAs) across Europe face important challenges in how they patrol and protect the borders. Their work becomes more problematic considering the heterogeneity of threats, the wideness of the surveyed area, the adverse weather conditions and the wide range of terrains. Towards delivering a solution including all such factors, the main goal of ROBORDER is to develop and demonstrate a fully-functional autonomous border surveillance system with unmanned mobile robots including aerial, water surface, underwater and ground vehicles which will incorporate multimodal sensors as part of an interoperable network. Our intention is to implement a heterogenous robot system and enhance it with detection capabilities for early identification of criminal activities at border and coastal areas along with…

EOPEN

EOPEN Open interoperable platform for unified access and analysis of Earth Observation data Earth Observation (EO) data access through the Copernicus data distributor systems has paved the way to monitor changes on Earth, using Sentinel data. One of the main objectives of EOPEN is to fuse Sentinel data with multiple, heterogeneous and big data sources, to improve the monitoring capabilities of the future EO downstream sector. Additionally, the involvement of mature ICT solutions in the Earth Observation sector shall address major challenges in effectively handling and disseminating Copernicus-related information to the wider user community, beyond the EU borders. EOPEN will fuse Copernicus big data content with observations from non-EO data, such as weather, environmental and social media information, aiming at interactive, real-time and user-friendly visualisations and decisions from early warning…

CONNEXIONs

CONNEXIONs InterCONnected NEXt-Generation Immersive IoT Platform of Crime and Terrorism DetectiON, PredictiON, InvestigatiON, and PreventiON Services CONNEXIONs aims to develop and demonstrate next-generation detection, prediction, prevention, and investigation services. These services will be based on multidimensional integration and correlation of heterogeneous multimodal data, and delivery of pertinent information to various stakeholders in an interactive manner tailored to their needs, through augmented and virtual reality environments. The CONNEXIONs solution encompasses the entire lifecycle of law enforcement operations including: pre-occurrence crime prediction and prevention during-occurrence LEA operations post-occurrence investigation, and crime-scene simulation and 3D reconstruction. CONNEXIONs will meaningfully enhance operational and (near) real-time situational awareness, through automated identification, interpretation, fusion and correlation of multiple heterogeneous big data sources, as well as their delivery via immersive solutions. Such multimodal data include Surface/Deep/Dark Web…

beAWARE

beAWARE Enhancing decision support and management services in extreme weather climate events In every disaster and crisis, incident time is the enemy, and getting accurate information about the scope, extent, and impact of the disaster is critical to creating and orchestrating an effective disaster response and recovery effort. The main goal of beAWARE is to provide support in all the phases of an emergency incident. More specifically, we propose an integrated solution to support forecasting, early warnings, transmission and routing of the emergency data, aggregated analysis of multimodal data and management the coordination between the first responders and the authorities. Our intention is to rely on platforms, theories and methodologies that are already used for disaster forecasting and management and add the elements that are necessary to make them working…

MULTIFORESEE

MULTIFORESEE MULTI-modal Imaging of FOREnsic SciEnce Evidence The main objective of the COST Action CA16101, entitled MULTI-modal Imaging of FOREnsic SciEnce Evidence (MULTI-FORESEE)- tools for Forensic Science, is to promote innovative, multi-informative, operationally deployable and commercially exploitable imaging solutions/technology to analyse forensic evidence. Forensic evidence includes, but not limited to, fingermarks, hair, paint, biofluids, digital evidence, fibers, documents and living individuals. Imaging technologies include optical, mass spectrometric, spectroscopic, chemical, physical and digital forensic techniques complemented by expertise in IT solutions and computational modelling. Imaging technologies enable multiple physical and chemical information to be captured in one analysis, from one specimen, with information being more easily conveyed and understood for a more rapid exploitation. The enhanced value of the evidence gathered will be conducive to much more informed investigations and judicial…

DESMOS

DESMOS Smart Interconnected Infrastructures for Security and Protection The goal of DESMOS project is to combine technology and human resources to provide a protection and security environment for citizens, emphasizing on tourists, by creating the appropriate infrastructure to address a set of ‘urgent’ situations. Given that the use of mobile and portable devices is now widespread, the project intends to use existing technology and customization for the benefit of citizens. Emergencies that may arise may be of a medical nature (allergies, medical conditions), dangerous incidents (e.g. thefts, vandalism) or situations encountered in crowded places (e.g. child disappearance). Within the framework of the project, a platform for participatory cooperation between people and infrastructures will be created and through the reporting of incidents and emergencies using ICT, assistance will be provided by…

ARESIBO

ARESIBO Augmented Reality Enriched Situation Awareness for Border Security ARESIBO aims at improving the efficiency of the border surveillance systems by providing the operational teams and the tactical command and control level with an accurate and comprehensive information. The pillars of research in ARESIBO are three-fold: (i). Set-up a complete configuration at tactical and execution level to optimize the collaboration between human and sensors (fixed and mobile), (ii) Improve situation awareness by enhancing the understanding of the situation through adapted processing of sensor data, correlation between heterogeneous data and information and creation of knowledge through deep learning techniques and (iii) Create a situation awareness capability at C2 level that will combine reports on previous missions, real time situation understanding and threat analysis for future actions. This capability will be used…

ECHO

ECHO European network of Cybersecurity centres and competence Hub for innovation and Operations ECHO delivers an organized and coordinated approach to improve proactive cyber defence of the European Union, through effective and efficient multi-sector collaboration. The Partners will execute on a 48-month work plan to develop, model and demonstrate a network of cyber research and competence centres, with a central competence at the hub. The Central Competence Hub serves as the focal point for the ECHO Multi-sector Assessment Framework enabling multi-sector dependencies management, provision of an ECHO Early Warning System, an ECHO Federation of Cyber Ranges and management of an expanding collection of Partner Engagements. The ECHO Multi-sector Assessment Framework refers to the analysis of challenges and opportunities derived from sector specific use cases, transversal cybersecurity needs analysis and development…

aqua3S

aqua3S Enhancing Standardisation strategies to integrate innovative technologies for Safety and Security in existing water networks Exposure of citizens to potential disasters has led to vulnerable societies that require risk reduction measures. Drinking water is one of the main risk sources when its safety and security are not ensured. aqua3S combines novel technologies in water safety and security, aiming to standardize existing sensor technologies complemented by state-of-the-art detection mechanisms. Hence, it could propose innovative solutions to water facilities and responsible authorities in order to detect and tackle water-related crises in a timely manner. On the one hand, sensor networks are deployed in water supply networks and sources, supported by complex sensors for enhanced detection; on the other hand, sensor measurements are supported by videos from Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), satellite…

INGENIOUS

INGENIOUS The First Responder (FR) of the Future: a Next Generation Integrated Toolkit (NGIT) for Collaborative Response, increasing protection and augmenting operational capacity Today’s First Responders (FR) are using technology of the past. During their primary mission of saving lives and preserving society’s safety and security, FRs face a multitude of challenges. In both small scale emergencies and large scale disasters, they often deal with life-threatening situations, hazardous environments, uncharted surroundings and limited awareness. Threats and hazards evolve rapidly, crossing municipalities, regions and nations with speed and ease. Armouring public safety services with all the tools that modern technology has to offer is critical. Such tools holistically enhance their protection and augment their operational capacities, assisting them in saving lives as well as ensuring their safe return from the disaster…

CREST

CREST Fighting Crime and TerroRism with an IoT-enabled Autonomous Platform based on an Ecosystem of Advanced IntelligEnce, Operations, and InveStigation Technologies CREST aims to equip LEAs with an advanced prediction, prevention, operation, and investigation platform by leveraging the IoT ecosystem, autonomous systems, and targeted technologies and building upon the concept of multidimensional integration and correlation of heterogeneous multimodal data streams (ranging from online content to IoT-enabled sensors) for a) threat detection and assessment, b) dynamic mission planning and adaptive navigation for improved surveillance based on autonomous systems, c) distributed command and control of law enforcement missions, d) sharing of information and exchange of digital evidence based on blockchain, and e) delivery of pertinent information to different stakeholders in an interactive manner tailored to their needs. CREST will also provide chain-of-custody,…

INFINITY

INFINITY IMMERSE. INTERACT. INVESTIGATE Infinity’s ambition is to become a flagship project against society’s most pressing cybercriminal, terrorist and hybrid threats. Synthesising the latest innovations in virtual and augmented reality, artificial intelligence and machine learning with big data and visual analytics, Infinity will deliver an integrated solution that aims to revolutionise data driven investigations. Bringing together a strong representation from national and supranational agencies with an end user-driven design, it will directly address the core needs of contemporary law enforcement. Specifically, it will equip investigators and analysts with cutting-edge tools to acquire, process, visualise and act upon the enormous quantities of data they are faced with every day. Bolstered by cognitive research, automated systems and instinctive interfaces and controls, Infinity will be designed and developed to maximise the potential of…

VECTOR

VECTOR Virtual Evidence Capture Tool for Ordnance Recovery The identification, classification and risk assessment of explosive devices such as unexploded ordinances (UXOs) and improvised explosive devices (IEDs), is of critical importance to NATO and its partners' strategic interests and tactical operations. However, there are considerable challenges in doing so without specialised expertise present on the ground. VECTOR is going to provide an innovative solution that will enable real-time communication and collaboration between first responders and off-site experts via a multimedia capture application and a command and control dashboard. By synthesising cutting-edge 3D photogrammetry, image recognition, data visualization, and augmented / virtual reality technology, VECTOR aims to go beyond the state-of-the-art to enhance explosive ordnance disposal (EOD) operations against a wide range of threats.