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ForeSight

Cyber Trust and Crime Prevention Defining the Project

The project was launched on the 10th June 2004 and all output documents are available to download or order. We will evaluate follow up activities around 12 months after launch and a report will be placed on this website.

1 Introduction

Following a review of the Foresight programme in 2002 11 Foresight panels were replaced by a rolling programme of a smaller number of focused projects - around 4 will be pursued at any one time - each of 9-15 months duration. Two pilot projects are looking at Flood and Coastal Defence and at Cognitive Systems. These will be completed in Autumn 2003. The third and fourth projects, launched in March 2003, are on Cyber Trust and Crime Prevention, and Exploiting the Electromagnetic Spectrum.

2 Cyber Trust and Crime Prevention Project: Aim

To explore the application and implications of next generation information technologies in areas such as identity and authenticity, surveillance, system robustness, security and information assurance and the basis for effective interaction and trust between people and machines.

3 Project Objectives

The objectives of the project are to:

  • Produce state-of-the-art reviews of relevant areas of science
  • Set out visions of the future that define a range of possible outcomes
  • Identify possible drivers, opportunities, threats, barriers to progress and models for decision-making
  • Create networks of scientists, business people and policy makers that can act on the findings to influence the future
  • Set out some specific key challenges and engage all those that can take them forward

4 Background

A consultation exercise carried out in autumn 2002 identified both cyber trust and crime prevention as topics of high priority. As several of the key themes overlapped the two areas, the new project will examine both.

5 Project Governance

The project will follow the new Foresight model of project governance:

  • A Home Office Minister will chair the Stakeholder Group advising on strategic direction
  • A Project Advisory Group will advise on achievement of agreed project objectives
  • The Project Director is Sir David King, Chief Scientific Adviser to HM Government and Head of the Office of Science and Technology
  • The core project team is drawn from Foresight

The Institution of Electrical Engineers (IEE) will collaborate with Foresight on this project. IEE's membership of professional engineers represents a pool of knowledge and experience of great value to the project and the project is in keeping with the aims and objectives of the IEE.

6 Initial Scoping

From the consultation exercise and from preliminary work a large number of subjects were identified as relevant to the proposed project. The table below lists the main categories. The initial phase of the project will be to establish an agreed scope that is both relevant and achievable. In doing this we will be asking how this project can add value and for whom, given previous and ongoing futures work in this and associated areas and extensive relevant research programmes in UK, Europe and other countries.

An initial workshop was held on 22 May, where a number of participants drawn from the research community, industry and from government departments considered the priorities.

Cyber Trust

  • Increasing benefits of interaction between people and ICT technology
  • People-to-system and system-to-system protocols for collaboration
  • Legal status and empowerment of Virtual Agents
  • Risk that society divides in new ways - technology acceptance

defining

Crime Prevention

  • Making value inaccessible to criminal
  • Detection of virtual crime - information as a commodity
  • Legal & regulatory framework appropriate to virtual and real world
  • Cross border implications of virtual world

Cyber Trust

  • Need to realise the benefits of interaction between people and technology
  • People - to - system and system - to - system protocols for collaboration
  • Do not yet understand the significance of reciprocity
  • Must anticipate legal status and empowerment of Virtual Agents
  • Risk that society divides in new ways - technology acceptance

Crime Prevention

  • Identity: must be safe, simple and secure in cyber and physical world
  • Principles: reduce damage potential and make value inaccessible to criminal
  • Must be able to detect cyber crime: information is a commodity and an asset
  • Trustworthiness: has to be inherent in (built into) systems
  • Legal & regulatory frameworks: need to be appropriate to cyber and physical worlds
  • Crime prevention: uses of technology may be intrusive - what costs / benefits

7 Stakeholders

Foresight aims to bring together people from the research community, business and Government to consider the future in each area of scientific and technological advance. Within these major areas there are numerous stakeholder groups:

  • People researching into ICT, communications, data management and the interaction between people and machines
  • Funding bodies, such as Research Councils and EU
  • Users of ICT, owners of information and systems, victims of crime
  • Human rights and civil liberty organisations
  • Enforcement agencies, such as the Police
  • Regulatory bodies
  • Government Departments, such as Home Office, Office of the e-Envoy
  • Holders of sensitive information, such as Banks, Building societies, Insurance companies
  • E-based businesses, such as e-tailers

8 Process

The outline project process is shown below.

key