Government Offers £2m To Fund Terrorist Targeting Tech

The government is set to make £2 million available for research into how technology and behavioural science can be used to pick out potential terrorists among crowds.

A competition has been set up by the Home Office and the government’s Defence and Security accelerator with aid from the Royal Society in order to receive research proposals on how  to tackle the threat of terrorist attacks that make use of weapons or explosives.

Tech v terror

Security minister Ben Wallace noted that the fund is part of the government’s commitment to review its counter-terrorism strategy following the recent Manchester and London terror attacks.

“The threat from terror does not stand still so neither will we, which is why we are calling on the best and the brightest from the science and technology sector to come forward with their ideas and proposals to support our ongoing work to keep people safe,” he said.

Lucy Mason, head of the Defence and Security Accelerator, urged anyone with ideas on how technology cna be used to tackle terrorism to subint a proposal.

“The terrible terrorist attacks in London and Manchester shocked and appalled all of us. Protecting people from terrorism is something we can all do, industry and academics and public servants,” Mason said.

“We don’t have all the answers. So we must bring together the brightest minds from the private sector, and academia to help find solutions to help keep our country and people safe and secure.”

Technology appears to be both a blessing and a curse when it comes to terrorism, with some discussions noting that encryption technology aids the activity of terrorists, while the likes of Facebook put artificial intelligence to use in order to keep terror-related content off its social network.

Can you protect your privacy online? Take our quiz!