POLITIEZONE BRECHT-MALLE-SCHILDE-ZOERSEL

Their core work

Politiezone Voorkempen is a Belgian local police zone serving the municipalities of Brecht, Malle, Schilde, and Zoersel in the Antwerp province. Within EU research, they act as an operational end-user for security technologies — providing real-world policing expertise, testing environments, and practitioner feedback to research consortia developing tools for counter-terrorism, crowd protection, border surveillance, and combating online crime. Their value lies in bridging the gap between laboratory-developed security solutions and the practical realities of frontline law enforcement.

What they specialise in

How they've shifted over time

Their earliest involvement (2016) centered on physical border surveillance and drone detection technology through SafeShore. From 2017 onward, the focus shifted decisively toward human-centred security — counter-radicalization, crowd protection methodologies, and combating online crime. This evolution mirrors the broader European security agenda moving from hardware-focused border control toward prevention, community policing, and digital threats.

Moving toward prevention-oriented, human-centred security approaches — future partners should expect interest in tools that help local police address radicalization, online crime, and community safety rather than traditional surveillance hardware.

How they like to work

They never coordinate projects — they consistently join as a participant or third party, which is typical for law enforcement end-users who contribute operational requirements and testing capacity rather than research leadership. With 72 unique partners across 20 countries from just 5 projects, they work exclusively in large consortia (averaging 14+ partners per project). This broad but non-leading pattern indicates an organization valued for its practitioner perspective rather than its research output.

Despite being a small local police force, they have built connections with 72 partners across 20 countries through security research consortia. Their network spans a wide European footprint, likely including other law enforcement agencies, universities, and security technology developers.

What sets them apart

As a local police zone rather than a national agency, they offer something rare in EU security research: the ground-level, operational perspective of community policing. Consortium builders seeking a Belgian law enforcement end-user with experience across multiple security domains — from crowd protection to counter-radicalization to online crime — get a partner already accustomed to multi-national research collaboration. Their small organizational scale means direct access to practitioners, not bureaucratic intermediaries.

Highlights from their portfolio

• TRIVALENT
  Largest funding received (EUR 227,411) and addresses the high-priority topic of counter-radicalization through counter-narratives.
• LETS-CROWD
  Directly focused on law enforcement human factors — the most operationally relevant project to their core policing mission, producing a practical policy-making toolkit.