From supply chain attacks and targeted data breaches to artificial intelligence-based spear phishing attacks and hybrid work, it’s clear that the cyber threat landscape remains tense.
To put the scale into perspective, if cybercrime was a country, it would be the third biggest global economy after the USA and China.
Cyber security experts at SoSafe (specialist in the design and delivery of cyber security awareness and training) report that cybercrime-as-a-service is becoming the standard business model, and attack vectors are evolving almost by the minute.
According to Charity Digital, who offer cyber security services to the charity sector, cybercrime continues to be a huge problem for individuals, businesses, and charities around the world, costing them over £4 trillion annually.
To put that in perspective, if cybercrime was a country, it would be the third biggest global economy after the USA and China.
And the most recent Internet Organized Crime Threat Assessment (IOCTA), published by Europol’s European Cybercrime Centre (EC3), reveals that cybercrime is becoming more aggressive and confrontational. This can be seen across the various forms of cybercrime, including abuse of encryption, cryptocurrencies, high-tech crimes, and data breaches.
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Cyber call
Against that backdrop, and recognizing the need to drive new and innovative approaches to tackle cybercrime, the European Commission has made €8million available via the Internal Security Fund (ISF) for new initiatives to improve digital investigations.
As the call is open to non-EU countries and those currently negotiating association agreements, the funding will no doubt be of direct interest to digital investigation innovators across the cybercrime policing landscape.
As this call is open to non-EU countries and those currently negotiating association agreements, UK police forces can apply, and the funding will no doubt be of direct interest to digital investigation innovators across the cybercrime policing landscape.
Innovative proposals are being sought from applicants addressing at least one, but ideally more, of the following priorities in cybercrime and digital investigations:
- Developing operational capacity and expertise of law enforcement and judicial authorities, and supporting cross-border co-operation in the field of cybercrime.
- Development of investigative and forensics tools to address the challenges posed by the use of encryption by criminals and its impact on criminal investigations, and supporting law enforcement authorities’ engagement in the area of internet governance.
- Fostering cross-border co-operation between law enforcement and/or judicial authorities and private entities; this includes, for instance, the establishment of mechanisms supporting public-private co-operation and mechanisms to enhance reporting of crime to law enforcement authorities.
Proposals which match most closely these priorities will be evaluated as particularly relevant. Applicants are therefore invited to consider very carefully the links between their proposal and the priorities of the call before submitting a proposal application by the deadline of 15 September.
Innovation impact
The ISF programme is well suited to police research and innovative activities, having a focus on ensuring the research is brought to operational reality. ISF projects demand positive impact results and the current call for cybercrime and digital investigations is no exception.
Projects submitted under the current cyber call must aim to achieve positive outcomes including an increase in the operational capacity of law enforcement, an increase in the availability of technical tools for law enforcement, and an increased awareness to build synergies amongst relevant stakeholders.
To support the delivery of expected outcomes, applicants should seek to enhance the operational capacity of law enforcement and/or judicial authorities to investigate cyber-attacks and cyber enabled crime, and to deliver new investigative techniques and tools (including for digital forensics) with a focus on the top threat priority areas.
These include digital forensics (such as mobile, computer, network, IoT and vehicle forensics); visual data analysis; malware analysis and reverse engineering capabilities; the analysis and seizure of cryptocurrencies; efficient storage; processing; the analysis and transfer of big data; understanding and exploiting ‘threat intelligence’ and metadata; and Dark Web monitoring.
Invest to innovate
Delivering innovations to transform aspects of policing not only requires courage and confidence from senior leadership, but it also requires the development of a working environment which welcomes and nurtures creativity, as well as a framework to capture, invest and operationalize new ideas.
The digitalization of policing in the UK continues to expand, and the investment in new and innovative automated systems, from communications to data analytics, is progressing at pace.
But as public authorities increasingly rely on front and back office digital systems which underpin their critical operations, it also serves to amplify and accelerate their cyber security risks.
Unfortunately, the levels of investment to innovate through increasing levels of digitalization are not being matched by investments in robust cyber security postures or the development in new investigative tools to tackle cybercrime.
An essential element in the continued development of UK cybercrime policing is the investment in innovation. This requires the allocation of time and resource dedicated to the co-design and co-delivery of new digital investigative tools, techniques, and technologies. Hiring IT services just like the IT services Virginia Beach is one way to protect you from modern cybersecurity risks.
Delivering innovations to transform aspects of policing not only requires courage and confidence from senior leadership, but it also requires the development of a working environment which welcomes and nurtures creativity, as well as a framework to capture, invest and operationalize new ideas.
Opportunities to push the boundaries of contemporary police policy, practice and procedure beyond cultural norms are becoming increasingly rare as pressures upon policing have never been greater.
But the current ISF cyber call offers great opportunities for cybercrime investigation collaboration and co-operation with EU law enforcement agency partners.
Moreover, the participation in the call aligns to the UK’s National Cyber Strategy (published last year) which set out an ambitious cyber vision for the UK by 2030 to continue to be a leading responsible and democratic cyber power, able to protect and promote its interests in and through cyberspace in support of national goals.
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