STARLIGHT, an innovation project backed by the European union that aims to enhance the EU’s strategic autonomy in the field of artificial intelligence (AI) for law enforcement agencies (LEAs), started the 1st of October 2021.

The launch of STARLIGHT (Sustainable Autonomy and Resilience for LEAs using AI against High priority Threats) was officially marked the 6th and 7th October 2021 at a kick-off meeting held in Paris, France.

STARLIGHT is a four-year collaborative innovation project coordinated by CEA (The French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission) that aims to improve the widespread understanding of legal and ethical usage of AI across law enforcement agencies, reinforcing their investigative and cybersecurity operations and helping them to combat the misuse of AI-supported crime and terrorism.

Web-IQ will take a leading role in the research on how AI can improve the field of Open Source Intelligence

For the next four years, 52 partners representing 18 European countries, including 15 LEAs from 13 countries, will be working together to develop a new sustainable community. They will build a cohesive and strategic landscape that delivers interoperable and trustworthy AI solutions that uphold ethical and societal values to tackle high priority threats for all LEAs across Europe.

The partners designed STARLIGHT to build capabilities and capacities in AI within LEAs, but also within research and industry organisations who support LEAs.

It is an honour to work with law enforcement agencies and leading industry and research partners on such an important topic for the future of Europe
Mathijs Homminga, CTO of Web-IQ.

The main outcomes expected from this ambitious project are

  • The improvement and enrichment of LEAs’ knowledge and awareness of how AI can reinforce their operational and cybersecurity capabilities,
  • the development of a cybersecurity strategy and of the associated effective measures to proactively protect AI LEA solutions against cyber threats (including provision for trustworthy AI),
  • the delivery of a framework as environment for multi-stakeholder, collaborative AI analytics,
  • and the creation of the European AI hub for LEAs as the centre of gravity for the European AI for LEA vision.

STARLIGHT has a duration of 48 months, starting from the 1st of October 2021, and a total budget of 18.8 million euros, of which 17.0 million euros funded by the European Union.

More information

For more information about the STARLIGHT project, visit the project website or follow @Starlight_H2020 on Twitter. Project contact: starlight@cea.fr

Project website