Migration (TCP 1) Open Call

Status: Open Closed
Scope

MEDEA’s Thematic Community of Practitioners for the management of migration and asylum seeker flows (TCP1) invites solution providers, researchers, academics, policy makers and of course experienced practitioners in this field to jointly explore proposals that will advance existing practitioner’s capabilities in the following areas:

    1. Absence of an independent authority to monitor NGO operations. CGF.1
    2. Need for a common European migration and asylum policy and need to amend and reinforce the Common European Asylum System (CEAS), so that practitioners’ requirements and needs are represented within the CEAS network CGF.2&6
    3. Insufficient means and lack of coordination for effective Search and Rescue (SaR) Operations CGF.3&4
    4. No adequate training is provided to practitioners regarding current legislation with respect to migrant smuggling and the protection of unaccompanied minors. CGF.5
    5. Lack of effective and enhanced cooperation among EU Member States, as well as between Member States and third countries – Need for an advanced return process. CGF.7
    6. Information databases / repositories from various practitioners at National and European level are not interconnected.CGF.8
    7. Lack of a common risk analysis process. CGF.9
    8. Existing technological tools used by practitioners are outdated CGF.10
    9. Health risks related to the daily operations of practitioners. CGF.11

     

Solution providers / industry will have a unique opportunity to engage in a constructive dialogue with first line practitioners working in migration and asylum from all over Europe and understand their operational needs. Researchers and academia will be offered opportunities to understand the root cause of technology related shortcomings, while policy makers will debate with practitioners the challenges from existing regulatory frameworks. Further to the above, the responders of the call will be offered incentives and awards.

Objectives

TCP1 security practitioners looking for innovation approaches to eliminate / restrict / limit the above-mentioned capability gaps. Potential advancement and innovative solutions in the following areas are of interest to them.

  • Real time monitoring of migratory routes 
  • Lawful interception of communications and internet-based communications as to enhance practitioners situational awareness
  • Detection of fraudulent documents
  • Speech recognition solutions to facilitate practitioners operations
  • Prediction methods for migratory flows.
Topics to be discussed

Specifically, the TCP1 MEDEA Network of Practitioners would like to explore and discuss the following technology-oriented topics:

 

  • Intelligence acquisition about the route the migrants followed from their country of origin to EU external borders
  • Monitoring / surveying parts of migration routes in real time (where possible)
  • Use of SIGINT, OSINT and HUMINT to advance efficiency in SAR missions (Both Land and Sea)
  • Lawful intercepts of smartphone text and voice applications that use encryption technology (like WhatsApp, Telegram, Signal, ) to intercept trafficking in Human beings and other Organised Crime Group (OCG) activities.
  • Option to use State of the Art (SOTA) automatic speech recognition (ASR) solutions to detect spoken language, accent and dialects.
  • Advances in the detection of fraudulent documents
  • Advances in prediction modelling for migration flows
  • EU legislation portal where all EU and national regulation are accessible to practitioners and development of training collateral and certification programs
  • Tools to advance asylum request and automate processes flow based on past cases
  • SOTA solutions to advance detection capabilities
  • Proposals for unmanned solutions, surveillance systems, detection and countermeasures technologies

RDI Day

After the Open Call to Academia and Industry, a Research, Development, and Innovation (RDI) Day will be organised. Responders to the open call (security stakeholders, industries, academia, research organisations and SMEs) will be able to present pertinent solutions to MEDEA members in high level of operational details.

Incentives

MEDEA will support a number of solution providers that will be invited for the “hands-on demos” with a voucher funding scheme to cover travelling and accommodation expenses, transportation of equipment and some consumable costs. A total amount of 15.000 euros is allocated for the TCP1 demonstration event (organised by practitioners), aiming to assist SMEs, Academia, and Research Projects to participate.

The demonstration event will be an attractive opportunity for solution providers to present the use of their tools in simulated real-life conditions and engage with a community of practitioners from MEDEA and other networks of practitioners.

Awards

There will also be a budget of 15.000 Euros so as to award challenge prizes for innovative solutions that fulfil (or will fulfil) the identified TCP capability gaps. The prize awards will be defined based on the number of the capability gaps, their priority and the urgency to fulfil said gaps (time horizon). The means to address these capability gaps will not be prescribed, leaving contestants total freedom to come up with the most promising and effective solutions. The MEDEA prize award will aim to attract a wider range of innovators, provide opportunities to innovators to forge new partnerships, promote new products and services and spur interest in the problem areas defined by the practitioners.

Click here to submit your Application.

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