Periodic Reporting for period 1 - NOTIONES (iNteracting netwOrk of inTelligence and securIty practitiOners with iNdustry and acadEmia actorS)
Okres sprawozdawczy: 2021-09-01 do 2022-11-30
NOTIONES is a Latin lemma meaning “notions, concepts, ideas, investigations, examinations, cognisance, becoming acquainted” and therefore refers to “being informed”. The NOTIONES project brings this concept to the security and law enforcement domain, aiming at improving the knowledge of security professionals and intelligence practitioners with the latest innovation and technology assets available.
The NOTIONES project (https://www.notiones.eu/) is a five years’ duration Coordination and Support Action project funded by the European Union. The NOTIONES Network main objective is to bring together experts in the fields of security and intelligence to identify the challenges and needs associated with contemporary intelligence processes and the role of technology in their operations. The NOTIONES Network of practitioners come from security and intelligence services of EU Member States and Associated Countries. The Network includes technology experts, experts in security research programming and practitioners (14 organisations) from military, civil, financial, judiciary, local, national and international polices, coming from 9 EU Members States, 4 Associated Countries and 1 Other Countries.
The output recommendations arising from the studies and discussions among the experts in the NOTIONES Network will be synthesized into specifications that can be provided to industry and academy across Europe, providing tangible benefits to those organisations and individuals engaged in intelligence, security and related work.
After an intensive initial phase of state-of-the-art review to identify challenges and gaps around research and technology assets, the project work is organised in an iterative cycle that will be ongoing for the whole duration of the project, with a total of five rounds of innovation monitoring and discussions, and new focus areas identified periodically.
Therefore, the NOTIONES project will continuously work in the monitoring of technologies and the definition of requirements and recommendations for their industrialization for intelligence and security applications will provide a great advantage to practitioners as well as themes for future EC-funded research projects in the fields of intelligence and security.
As the matching between technologies and intelligence needs or terrorist threats will be carried out, the most promising areas of innovation will be selected as focus of the working groups and will be subject to an in-depth monitoring based on horizon scanning techniques and investigation of research projects addressing them. This will allow to identify professionals, companies and academy representatives that will be involved in the interaction activities of NOTIONES, especially in conferences organised by the project.
Furthermore, the results of the NOTIONES project will be presented to the broad intelligence community in workshops towards the end of each year of the project and will contribute to the definition of further security and intelligence research.
The NOTIONES project (https://www.notiones.eu/) is a five years’ duration Coordination and Support Action project funded by the European Union. The NOTIONES Network main objective is to bring together experts in the fields of security and intelligence to identify the challenges and needs associated with contemporary intelligence processes and the role of technology in their operations. The NOTIONES Network of practitioners come from security and intelligence services of EU Member States and Associated Countries. The Network includes technology experts, experts in security research programming and practitioners (14 organisations) from military, civil, financial, judiciary, local, national and international polices, coming from 9 EU Members States, 4 Associated Countries and 1 Other Countries.
The output recommendations arising from the studies and discussions among the experts in the NOTIONES Network will be synthesized into specifications that can be provided to industry and academy across Europe, providing tangible benefits to those organisations and individuals engaged in intelligence, security and related work.
After an intensive initial phase of state-of-the-art review to identify challenges and gaps around research and technology assets, the project work is organised in an iterative cycle that will be ongoing for the whole duration of the project, with a total of five rounds of innovation monitoring and discussions, and new focus areas identified periodically.
Therefore, the NOTIONES project will continuously work in the monitoring of technologies and the definition of requirements and recommendations for their industrialization for intelligence and security applications will provide a great advantage to practitioners as well as themes for future EC-funded research projects in the fields of intelligence and security.
As the matching between technologies and intelligence needs or terrorist threats will be carried out, the most promising areas of innovation will be selected as focus of the working groups and will be subject to an in-depth monitoring based on horizon scanning techniques and investigation of research projects addressing them. This will allow to identify professionals, companies and academy representatives that will be involved in the interaction activities of NOTIONES, especially in conferences organised by the project.
Furthermore, the results of the NOTIONES project will be presented to the broad intelligence community in workshops towards the end of each year of the project and will contribute to the definition of further security and intelligence research.
In the first period of fifteen months, NOTIONES has achieved to set up the strategic and operational collaboration framework of the NOTIONES Network of practitioners, and it has advanced in the horizon scanning and technology studies for both intelligence and terrorist threats countering.
In summary, the period has seen the initial stunning results of the project in the following areas:
- Built on top of 15 interviews carried out to NOTIONES partners and a thorough review of state-of-the-art practices, the challenges and gaps in intelligence cycle were identified . Furthermore, a deep review of ethics issues in intelligence was developed.
- Seven comprehensive technology surveys produced to identify key technology assets and initiatives for intelligence disciplines, such as IMINT and SIGINT, MASINT, OSINT, and HUMINT, as well as for horizontal technologies such as Big Data, AI and surveillance.
- Five comprehensive reports about terrorist process, including terrorist ideology and narratives, terrorist behaviour, terrorist financing, cyber terrorism, and terrorist means of attack.
- The definition of the methodology for research and innovation monitoring to be followed in the project.
- The completion of the first two rounds of monitoring of research in EU projects and horizon scanning, as well as the monitoring of emerging terrorist threats.
- The organisation of the First NOTIONES Conference in Brussels (14th June 2022), gathering a total of 47 participants from both outside and inside NOTIONES Consortium.
- The organisation of the First NOTIONES workshop which was held online (15th February 2022) and supported by an interactive tool platform for collaboration among the participants. The workshop served to establish the focus areas of discussion in the project and select the first topics of the working groups.
- The organisation of the first round of Working Groups in the project for discussion of the first two focus areas: WG1- Challenges to monitor and collect data from the darknet, and WG2 - Technological Needs, Solutions and Improvements to the Analysis Phase of the Intelligence Cycle.
- The launching of the project Website (https://www.notiones.eu/) and set up of the project profile in Social Networks.
- The communication of project news and events as well as the first NOTIONES Newsletter and the first whitepaper (on OSINT).
- Attendance to more than 8 events where NOTIONES was presented.
- Preparation of the initial exploitation plans identifying exploitable results.
- The beginning of the collaboration with the network of sister projects supported by NOTIONES, including links established with PopAI, EU-HYBNET, CC-DRIVER, CYBERSPACE, AI4CYBER, ECHO, INFINITY, CTC, ALIGNER, SHIELD, UNCOVER, ODYSEUS and CORE.
In summary, the period has seen the initial stunning results of the project in the following areas:
- Built on top of 15 interviews carried out to NOTIONES partners and a thorough review of state-of-the-art practices, the challenges and gaps in intelligence cycle were identified . Furthermore, a deep review of ethics issues in intelligence was developed.
- Seven comprehensive technology surveys produced to identify key technology assets and initiatives for intelligence disciplines, such as IMINT and SIGINT, MASINT, OSINT, and HUMINT, as well as for horizontal technologies such as Big Data, AI and surveillance.
- Five comprehensive reports about terrorist process, including terrorist ideology and narratives, terrorist behaviour, terrorist financing, cyber terrorism, and terrorist means of attack.
- The definition of the methodology for research and innovation monitoring to be followed in the project.
- The completion of the first two rounds of monitoring of research in EU projects and horizon scanning, as well as the monitoring of emerging terrorist threats.
- The organisation of the First NOTIONES Conference in Brussels (14th June 2022), gathering a total of 47 participants from both outside and inside NOTIONES Consortium.
- The organisation of the First NOTIONES workshop which was held online (15th February 2022) and supported by an interactive tool platform for collaboration among the participants. The workshop served to establish the focus areas of discussion in the project and select the first topics of the working groups.
- The organisation of the first round of Working Groups in the project for discussion of the first two focus areas: WG1- Challenges to monitor and collect data from the darknet, and WG2 - Technological Needs, Solutions and Improvements to the Analysis Phase of the Intelligence Cycle.
- The launching of the project Website (https://www.notiones.eu/) and set up of the project profile in Social Networks.
- The communication of project news and events as well as the first NOTIONES Newsletter and the first whitepaper (on OSINT).
- Attendance to more than 8 events where NOTIONES was presented.
- Preparation of the initial exploitation plans identifying exploitable results.
- The beginning of the collaboration with the network of sister projects supported by NOTIONES, including links established with PopAI, EU-HYBNET, CC-DRIVER, CYBERSPACE, AI4CYBER, ECHO, INFINITY, CTC, ALIGNER, SHIELD, UNCOVER, ODYSEUS and CORE.
Being a CSA, NOTIONES supports other stakeholders, scientists and projects, and the work focuses on identification, analysis and reporting of existing technologies that are expected to improve the intelligence work of the law enforcement practitioners.
NOTIONES project plan does not include the design, development of any technology for intelligence at all. Furthermore, it does not carry out any intelligence activity at all where the studied technologies may be used, but the project only supports collaboration and discussions on technology advancements among project partners and other stakeholders around law enforcement research. Therefore, no outcomes or activities of NOTIONES may pose ethics and societal risks to European citizens nor any other citizens, so no damage is expected from the project in these aspects.
In its first 15 months, the project has reviewed the state of the art of technologies supporting intelligence and counter terrorism and a first round of collaborative meetings among the experts has been held to discuss different aspects of the applicability of such technologies. In the future, four additional rounds will be held while the project will periodically monitor and horizon scanning the technology innovations supporting law enforcement activity.
NOTIONES project plan does not include the design, development of any technology for intelligence at all. Furthermore, it does not carry out any intelligence activity at all where the studied technologies may be used, but the project only supports collaboration and discussions on technology advancements among project partners and other stakeholders around law enforcement research. Therefore, no outcomes or activities of NOTIONES may pose ethics and societal risks to European citizens nor any other citizens, so no damage is expected from the project in these aspects.
In its first 15 months, the project has reviewed the state of the art of technologies supporting intelligence and counter terrorism and a first round of collaborative meetings among the experts has been held to discuss different aspects of the applicability of such technologies. In the future, four additional rounds will be held while the project will periodically monitor and horizon scanning the technology innovations supporting law enforcement activity.