Combining data for tracking cybercrimes
Cybercriminals are increasingly selling their specialised tools, materials and services (Crime-as-a-Service, CaaS). This enables individuals who lack the technical skills to commit cybercrimes themselves to hire others to commit them on their behalf. The number of CaaS services has increased significantly in recent years.
The three-year SafeHorizon research project, which started in the autumn of 2024, aims to curb CaaS crime using data and machine learning and to collect lawful evidence.
Researchers from the NISEC research group at Tampere University monitor cybercriminals, their activities and their organisations in the project. The group’s research focuses on combating online sexual violence against children, among other cybercrimes.
The project’s principal investigator, Postdoctoral Research Fellow Juha Nurmi, and Doctoral Researcher Arttu Paju are developing solutions to automate the detection and warning of illegal material on the Tor network—the “dark web”—to protect children.
Tampere University’s share of the project funding is €385,000.
Early warnings for law enforcement agencies
Researchers at Tampere University are monitoring cybercrime using contextual factors such as time, usernames, language, country and other metadata.
“The method allows tracking criminals without handling illegal content, and we can focus, for example, solely on metadata. With automatic identification, authorities could be notified about child sexual abuse material available through the Tor network on onion websites,” says Juha Nurmi.
Tampere University’s research can help develop early warnings for law enforcement agencies and other organisations to better prevent crimes.
Read more about the research project on SafeHorizon’s website.
