VATDIS Web Mapping - A Report on the Application of Open Standards and Open Architecture in Geospatial Interoperability for Emergency Management

This report provides an overview of the web mapping activities carried out in the VATDIS action in 2007. These web mapping activities aimed at integrating the work done for the Orchestra, Floodsite and Preview IP into one single demonstrator. In the main section of this report an outline is given of the reasons for integrating the projects and the contents of this integration. The report should be seen as a summary of the technical choices made in order to accomplish this integration. The annexes on this report help the more technical reader to understand the design of the demonstrator and to duplicate it for its own purposes.JRC.G.7-Traceability and vulnerability assessmen

Cryptographic security mechanism of the next generation digital tachograph system

JRC is in the process of evaluating the impact of update of the cryptographic security mechanisms for the next generation Digital Tachograph. The purpose of this document is to give background information about the cryptographic security mechanisms and vulnerabilities regarding the security mechanisms of the current Digital Tachograph System along with suggestions for the next generation Digital Tachograph security mechanisms. This document can be referred as an important reference to update the technical appendixes of the Tachograph regulation.JRC.G.7-Digital Citizen Securit

The Challenge of Resilience in a Globalised World

Resilience determines the capacity to successfully deal with difficult events and to adapt and overcome adversity. It creates stability in a changing world which in turn promotes job creation, economic growth and environmental sustainability. Resilience is a fundamental prerequisite for Europe as the largest integrated economic area in the world and has an important social dimension which requires the active cooperation of all stakeholders; citizens, the private sector, governments and NGOs included. This report discusses the concept of resilience from different perspectives and the role of science in the continuous process of building a resilient, stable, competitive and prosperous Europe.JRC.G-Institute for the Protection and Security of the Citizen (Ispra

Cybersecurity, our digital anchor: A European perspective

The Report ‘Cybersecurity – Our Digital Anchor’ brings together research from different disciplinary fields of the Joint Research Centre (JRC), the European Commission's science and knowledge service. It provides multidimensional insights into the growth of cybersecurity over the last 40 years, identifying weaknesses in the current digital evolution and their impacts on European citizens and industry. The report also sets out the elements that potentially could be used to shape a brighter and more secure future for Europe’s digital society, taking into account the new cybersecurity challenges triggered by the COVID-19 crisis. According to some projections, cybercrime will cost the world EUR 5.5 trillion by the end of 2020, up from EUR 2.7 trillion in 2015, due in part to the exploitation of the COVID-19 pandemic by cyber criminals. This figure represents the largest transfer of economic wealth in history, more profitable than the global trade in all major illegal drugs combined, putting at risk incentives for innovation and investment. Furthermore, cyber threats have moved beyond cybercrime and have become a matter of national security. The report addresses relevant issues, including: - Critical infrastructures: today, digital technologies are at the heart of all our critical infrastructures. Hence, their cybersecurity is already – and will become increasingly – a matter of critical infrastructure protection (see the cases of Estonia and Ukraine). - Magnitude of impact: the number of citizens, organisations and businesses impacted simultaneously by a single attack can be huge. - Complexity and duration of attacks: attacks are becoming more and more complex, demonstrating attackers’ enhanced planning capabilities. Moreover, attacks are often only detected post-mortem . - Computational power: the spread of malware also able to infect mobile and Internet of Things (IoT) devices (as in the case of Mirai botnet), hugely increases the distributed computational power of the attacks (especially in the case of denial of services (DoS)). The same phenomenon makes the eradication of an attack much more difficult. - Societal aspects: cyber threats can have a potentially massive impact on society, up to the point of undermining the trust citizens have in digital services. As such services are intertwined with our daily life, any successful cybersecurity strategy must take into consideration the human and, more generally, societal aspects. This report shows how the evolution of cybersecurity has always been determined by a type of cause-and-effect trend: the rise in new digital technologies followed by the discovery of new vulnerabilities, for which new cybersecurity measures must be identified. However, the magnitude and impacts of today's cyber attacks are now so critical that the digital society must prepare itself before attacks happen. Cybersecurity resilience along with measures to deter attacks and new ways to avoid software vulnerabilities should be enhanced, developed and supported. The ‘leitmotiv’ of this report is the need for a paradigm shift in the way cybersecurity is designed and deployed, to make it more proactive and better linked to societal needs. Given that data flows and information are the lifeblood of today’s digital society, cybersecurity is essential for ensuring that digital services work safely and securely while simultaneously guaranteeing citizens’ privacy and data protection. Thus, cybersecurity is evolving from a technological ‘option’ to a societal must. From big data to hyperconnectivity, from edge computing to the IoT, to artificial intelligence (AI), quantum computing and blockchain technologies, the ‘nitty-gritty’ details of cybersecurity implementation will always remain field-specific due to specific sectoral constraints. This brings with it inherent risks of a digital society with heterogeneous and inconsistent levels of security. To counteract this, we argue for a coherent, cross-sectoral and cross-societal cybersecurity strategy which can be implemented across all layers of European society. This strategy should cover not only the technological aspects but also the societal dimensions of ‘behaving in a cyber-secure way’. Consequently, the report concludes by presenting a series of possible actions instrumental to building a European digital society secure by design.JRC.E.3-Cyber and Digital Citizens' Securit

The genetic architecture of the human cerebral cortex

The cerebral cortex underlies our complex cognitive capabilities, yet little is known about the specific genetic loci that influence human cortical structure. To identify genetic variants that affect cortical structure, we conducted a genome-wide association meta-analysis of brain magnetic resonance imaging data from 51,665 individuals. We analyzed the surface area and average thickness of the whole cortex and 34 regions with known functional specializations. We identified 199 significant loci and found significant enrichment for loci influencing total surface area within regulatory elements that are active during prenatal cortical development, supporting the radial unit hypothesis. Loci that affect regional surface area cluster near genes in Wnt signaling pathways, which influence progenitor expansion and areal identity. Variation in cortical structure is genetically correlated with cognitive function, Parkinson's disease, insomnia, depression, neuroticism, and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder

A Simple Representation Scheme to Model Critical Infrastructure Interdependencies

Modern societies rely on systems and assets called "Critical Infrastructures" (CI) for performing essential activities in sectors such as energy, transport and ICT. Technically, any CI is a complex system of systems, interacting with its operators and users. Depending on different factors e.g. location, strategic importance, CIs can be threaten by various types of events e.g. natural hazards, technological risks, terrorist attacks. Examples of CI disruptions show how serious the consequences can be in terms of economic impacts, societal disturbance, fatalities... Some modeling & simulation (M&S) approaches exist to better understand the functioning and vulnerabilities of CIs. However, only few handle CI Interdependency (CII) issues at a high, abstract level. Yet, a generic formalism capturing the functioning of any CI in a simple way would be useful. This paper proposes a preliminary development answering questions such as: How can CI performance be characterized? How can one simulate a what-if scenario?JRC.DG.G.7-Traceability and vulnerability assessmen

SIMPLE NONCONTACT MULTIMODE FIBEROPTIC PROXIMITY SENSOR.

A noncontact proximity sensor built with plastic multimode fibers is presented. The sensor is based on the measurements of the intensity variations of the light scattered by a mobile rough object illuminated with several focused beams. The intensity maxima obtained when the object is at the focal points are used for rapid detection of its presence and orientation.SCOPUS: cp.pinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishe

Land Use Planning in the Vicinity of Chemical Sites. Risk-Informed Decision Making at a Local Community Level.

Abstract not availableJRC.(ISIS)-Institute For Systems, Informatics And Safet

Fuzzy qualitative modeling

SCOPUS: cp.kinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedIn: Bouchon B. Saitta L. Yager R.R. (eds) Uncertainty and Intelligent Systems. IPMU 1988. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 313. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg.International Conference on Information Processing and Management of Uncertainty in Knowledge-Based System

Monitoring the Transport by Road of Hazardous Substances and Risk Reduction: Results from an Italian Case-Study

This paper presents the results of a 3-year development and testing of a pilot system that monitors in real time the transport of hazardous substance by road in Italy. The pilot-system consists of 140 on-board units installed either on a tractor or a tanker, of a national service and communication centre, of three local operational centres and of end-user terminals. The architecture of the pilot-system was decided following the results of a benchmark exercise comparing communication and geo-localization technologies. The system allows real-time monitoring and control of the movement and operations of around 70 trucks transporting GPL, fuels or other hazardous liquid substances mostly originating from Italian industrial areas. Private companies owing the 70 trucks have access to all relevant data for real-time control and a posterior analyses. Off-line data analyses assist in reconstructing the journeys of each truck, controlling the truck operations and routes, providing a better understanding of the overall spatial and temporal distribution of transported hazardous substances in a specific area, performing risk analyses, identifying and ranking hotspots, and in conjunction with additional information concerning population, critical infrastructures or other potential targets existing on the territory, providing insights as to how vulnerable the territory is to these hazardous substances or, more precisely, to their misuses. The paper develops in more detail the system analysis approach adopted to design the pilot-system and the above-mentioned functionalities related to risk assessment.JRC.G.7-Traceability and vulnerability assessmen