RISEN: the new project to optimize and digitalize crime investigation

Innovation and technological development have now digitized our daily life and more and more companies, from the food sector to the design one up to the medical field, rely on high technology to improve and optimize their performance. 

The high performances and success of advanced technology also reached the world of investigations and scientific research and in fact the crime scene is about to take a step forward and become a smart 4.0 industry based on automation and digital innovations. 

Today we are talking about the new European project RISEN (Real-tIme on-site forenSic tracE qualification), supported by more than 20 partners from 12 different European countries, which aims to transform traditional methods used for scientific research and analysis into faster and more detailed approaches. Most of the time, the traditional forensic tests take a long time to give an accurate and reliable result, and time can become an enemy when it necessary to receive the results as soon as possible. 

Precisely for this reason, RISEN’s main objective is to create a network of contactless sensors that can optimize detection, identification, tracking and visualization directly on site and in real time, in order to reduce the time and resources used in laboratory and also to speed up the exchange of all information among LEAs. 

The sensors will be automated and will allow to identify, select and label the materials of all traces without being destructive and without using any type of direct contact. There will also be a real-time data exchange that will allow information to be sent to a system called 3D Augmented Crime Scene Investigation to reproduce an interactive 3D model of the scene. The augmented reality techniques and the realistic scene reproduction will give greater support to the investigators who will be able to carry out the investigations in a faster and more detailed way. 

Enea (national agency for new technologies, energy and sustainable economic development) is creating four new sensors (Raman, Libs, Lif and Crime light imaging) that will help identify, select and label the traces in a totally digital way. Roberto Chirico of the ENEA Diagnostic and Metrology Laboratory and coordinator of the RISEN project stated that: “Thanks to the network of contactless sensors that we will develop, it will be possible to carry out safe, rapid and in-depth investigations directly on the place where the crime took place, optimizing the detection, identification and interpretation of the traces found. This will give investigators greater security reducing investigation time and resources and, above all, it will give a more rapid exchange of information among the police forces of the European countries involved”. 

Augmented reality techniques and high-tech sensors will allow to revolutionize the crime scene which, thanks to digitalization, will be able to optimize and speed up the work of all those who carry out the investigations.