VICESSE RESEARCH GMBH

Their core work

VICESSE is a Vienna-based research centre specializing in security research, with a strong focus on law enforcement methodologies, crime prevention, and counter-radicalisation. They develop evidence-based tools and approaches for policing, financial crime investigation, and countering violent extremism. Their work bridges criminology, AI-driven intelligence analysis, and policy evaluation — helping law enforcement agencies and policymakers adopt more effective, rights-compliant security practices across Europe.

What they specialise in

How they've shifted over time

VICESSE's early H2020 work (2015–2018) centred on practical law enforcement tools — community policing, frontline domestic violence response, and traditional prosecution methods for tax crimes and corruption. From 2019 onward, their focus shifted decisively toward technology-driven security intelligence: AI, deep learning, knowledge graphs, OSINT, and spatial-temporal prediction for counter-terrorism and financial crime tracking. This evolution shows a research centre that started in criminology and policing policy and has progressively added computational and AI capabilities to its toolkit.

VICESSE is moving toward AI and data-driven intelligence tools for law enforcement, making them a strong partner for future projects combining security research with machine learning and open-source intelligence.

How they like to work

VICESSE operates exclusively as a consortium partner — they have never coordinated an H2020 project. With 82 unique partners across 25 countries, they maintain a wide and diverse network rather than returning to the same collaborators repeatedly. This suggests they are valued as a specialist contributor that different consortia seek out for their specific security research and evaluation expertise.

VICESSE has collaborated with 82 different partners across 25 countries, indicating a broad pan-European network. Their connections span law enforcement agencies, universities, and technology providers across the EU security research community.

What sets them apart

VICESSE occupies a distinctive niche at the intersection of criminology, policy evaluation, and AI-driven security technology — a combination few research centres offer. Their consistent focus on ethics and human rights alongside technical security work makes them particularly valuable for consortia that need to demonstrate responsible innovation. For coordinators building security proposals, VICESSE brings both the social science rigour to evaluate interventions and the technical awareness to work with AI and data analytics teams.

Highlights from their portfolio

• PROTAX
  Largest single grant (EUR 518,375) — addressed the intersection of tax crimes, corruption, and crypto-currencies, a topic with growing relevance.
• TRACE
  Most technically advanced project, combining AI, knowledge graphs, and e-evidence to track illicit financial flows and money laundering across borders.
• INDEED
  Represents their counter-radicalisation expertise with a comprehensive evidence-based evaluation framework for preventing and countering violent extremism.