Digital Europe Programme-funded project TRACY takes the stage at the Belgian presidency event

The first half of 2024 marks the Belgian presidency of the Council of the European Union. One of six priorities of the Belgian presidency for this semester is to strengthen EU’s competitiveness, notably the Presidency aims to enhance the role of research, development, and innovation to become a frontrunner in developing and commercialising tailored solutions that boost key EU value chains’ resilience and competitiveness.  

In this context, the Belgian Presidency is organising the event: From Research to Reality – digital solutions for European challenges, taking place on 5 and 6 February 2024. The event aims to explore the synergies between cutting-edge research in digital technologies under Horizon Europe and the impactful digitalisation initiatives within the Digital Europe Programme.  

One of the projects funded by Digital Europe Programme, TRACY, will take the stage in Day 1. The coordinator of the project will share more insights about the project during the session “Unlocking Synergies: Fostering Collaborative Innovation”. The project, which kickstarted in June 2023, is currently focusing on the creation of data-driven solutions for law enforcement investigations. TRACY is developing an Artificial Intelligence platform designed to make digital investigations more efficient by using telecommunications metadata from different sources. This platform will help identify behavioural patterns that could potentially support crime investigations and prevent crime.  

TRACY's open-source platform, which uses telecommunications metadata (from mobile network operators)  will be piloted in the premises of law enforcement agencies (LEAs) in Greece, Romania and Moldova in a fully operational environment, in full respect of fundamental rights and personal data protection. TRACY builds on previous EU-funded actions such as STARLIGH, ROXANNE and GRACE. Furthermore, the project also intends to reinforce Law Enforcement agencies’ knowledge and capabilities on AI-based e-evidence via a series of training sessions. 

Background 

The Digital Europe Programme (DIGITAL) aims to build the strategic digital capacities of the EU and to facilitate the wide deployment of digital technologies. With an overall budget of €7.5 billion, out of which €0.8 billion is managed by HaDEA, the programme will support investments in the following sectors: 

• High Performance Computing 

• Cloud, data and Artificial Intelligence 

• Cybersecurity 

• Advanced digital skills 

• Accelerating best use of technologies