Last Monday, 26 October, the Police Fireworks Hackathon took place with the support of KIVI and others. Had the hackathon originally been planned in our beautiful KIVI building, now corona forced to collaborate online. Unfortunately, we may not share all the unexpected and clever outcomes of the hackathon with a wide audience. The police are happy with the motivation the hackathon brought to all illegal fireworks detectives. Below is the police report.
You may have already heard the first cobras again. Or received the first nuisance reports. Or even made the first find. It can't be a surprise to anyone: the fireworks season is coming. To be one step ahead of the illegal trade this year, team Environment of the DLIO (National Unit) organised a fireworks hackathon together with BlueM. In mixed teams, OSINT colleagues from across the country teamed up with specialists from the public and private sectors to hunt down illegal fireworks trade on the internet.
Besides OSINT experts and cyber volunteers from various police units, a number of companies participated, including Shell, KPN, Defence, Ernst&Young, Chapter 8 and Zerocopter. Belgian cyber teachers, students from Hogeschool Leiden, the Police Academy and the Public Prosecution Service also joined in. A motley crew, therefore, in which networking and the exchange of knowledge and tools were certainly an important gain of the day.
Pep talk
Salim Hadri, co-founder Milvum and chairman of the computer science department of KIVI (Royal Institute of Engineers) kicked off. In a whirlwind pep talk "How to win a Hackathon", this eight-time Hackathon winner took the participants through the do's and don'ts at a Hackathon. His secret? 'Teamwork: know your role, and use each other's strengths. Be original. Try -by listening and discovering- to really get to the bottom of the problem. And keep your goals realistic. Good luck and have fun today'.
Huge hit
'With an 11.5-hour team session, we set a record anyway,' points out Niels Kool, one of the hackathon's BlueM organisers. But the smashing success is not only in the energy, but especially in the output'. 'A huge hit - like at the previous hackathon, where all participants could follow the arrest of a suspect live - we didn't have a huge hit here,' Niels continues. 'That also had to do with the topic. Last time it revolved around FAST NL. Then the question was, put very simply: we are looking for Henkie, where is Henkie? Now it was more about phenomena and patterns. Amazing how many concrete clues and insights came out of that anyway'.
So we thought Darkweb would be a place where it all happened. But it soon turned out that there were many valuable references to Insta, Telegram and Snapchat accounts And TikTok, whereas initially we thought it was mainly little girls with crazy dances that were active there.
Zooming in
It also turned out to be worth zooming in on storage and transfer sites that are in principle legal, but on closer inspection are sometimes used by illegal fireworks providers, usually unbeknownst to the legal owner. Perhaps the containers at the storage or transhipment company in your area of work are less innocent than they seem. Or lively trading takes place in the garage box around the corner'
Danger
René Paaij of the National Police Force, the initiator of this hackathon as theme holder Fireworks, complements Niels: 'In terms of danger, I think most colleagues recognise these signs: There is a sharp increase in injuries and more and more often fireworks are used as weapons against emergency workers. Professional fireworks in particular are becoming heavier and have the power of an explosive. Components (such as gunpowder) of fireworks are also used in connection with other crime (blasts, attacks, etc. )
Plenty of reasons to crack down on illegal fireworks, it seems to me.'
Short blow
The great thing about the Hackathon is that the day produced a number of tools, tips & tricks, which we as police will soon use to make a short blow in tackling (illegal) fireworks.
Treasure of information
'During the day, a wealth of data, clues and information was collected that our team will continue to dig into. So we may come back to you with even more tips and tricks via intranet,' concludes René. Niels adds: 'If you are enthusiastic and would like to organise a hackathon yourself, don't hesitate to contact BlueM'.
Text: Marlous van Eijsden
