Cooperation agreement signed between Fraunhofer SIRIOS and the state of Berlin
News from Apr. 08, 2024
On April 8, the state of Berlin, represented by Iris Spranger, Berlin Senator for the Interior and Sport, Police Vice President Marco Langner and State Fire Director Dr. Karsten Homrighausen, and Fraunhofer SIRIOS, represented by SIRIOS spokesperson Prof. Dr. Manfred Hauswirth, signed a joint cooperation agreement. This will enable public administration and science to cooperate even more closely and jointly develop, test and apply new technologies – for security situations specifically tailored to Berlin.
Many aspects of security are concentrated in a very small area in the German capital, so Berlin offers optimal conditions for simulations. The cooperation agreement is an important step for the future of security in Berlin, explains Berlin's Senator of the Interior Iris Spranger: “It is important to me to think and plan ahead for the security of the people in our city - from major events and dangerous situations to extreme weather events. Who does what? When? How? Anyone who only thinks about these questions on the spot is wasting valuable or even vital time. We therefore draw on specially developed coping concepts, third-party experience, practical and theoretical exercises and much more. With the cooperation agreement that has now been concluded, we are taking a further step towards the future of security in Berlin together with the research community. By strengthening crisis management, simulations and visualizations as well as intelligent algorithms to increase the speed of decision-making and reaction, real situations should become more predictable and therefore more manageable - for security, for people and for Berlin.”
Prof. Dr. Manfred Hauswirth, spokesperson for Fraunhofer SIRIOS and executive director of Fraunhofer FOKUS, adds: “Public security is facing major challenges, whether due to climate-related extreme events or the generally tense security situation. Due to the diverse dependencies between people, technology and infrastructures in our highly networked society, disruptions or attacks can quickly develop far-reaching effects, for example on the supply of electricity, internet, telecommunications, water and logistics.Fraunhofer SIRIOS in Berlin combines the expertise of the Fraunhofer Institutes EMI, FOKUS, IOSB and IVI to research and simulate these dependencies. The close cooperation with authorities and organizations with security tasks is particularly important to us in our work, as our research is very application-oriented.the cooperation agreement brings security research and state security authorities at Berlin state level even closer together.”
Joint workshops and conferences are held regularly as part of the cooperation, research-relevant data is exchanged and there is direct scientific monitoring of operational situations. The aim is to penetrate these analytically and, among other things, to develop a test and demonstration environment (lab) for complex security scenarios. Current research results are to be presented in future at an event organized by Fraunhofer with the participation of the security authorities. The cooperation agreement was concluded for an indefinite period, as the security authorities' measures must also keep pace with future developments and should therefore be continuously developed further.