Last year, Jens Spahn said that after the pandemic there would likely be many things for which we would have to ask for apologies. Shortly thereafter, he described the start of the vaccination campaign in December as “bumpy.” Two statements that perfectly capture the dilemma faced by politics, business, and society when rapid decisions are required in crises. What’s missing are reliable courses of action for specific scenarios to steer crisis processes safely. Under the consortium lead of Düsseldorf-based Advaneo GmbH, a research project is now starting that will make it possible to forecast the impacts of crisis situations.
The solution: Data-driven crisis management
In the PAIRS project (Privacy-Aware, Intelligent and Resilient Crisis Management), an open data structure is being developed that, using hybrid AI technology in a cross-domain data space, can anticipate both the initial crisis event and the reactions of different stakeholders. To support crisis management effectively with artificial intelligence (AI), the applications being developed must correctly capture how crisis situations evolve. This means overcoming the frequent lack of data and keeping existing data continuously up to date—while safeguarding data protection and sovereignty. PAIRS addresses these challenges with a decentralized platform architecture that allows access to a wealth of relevant data while ensuring data privacy. First, data sources from ecosystems such as the European cloud infrastructure GAIA-X and other domain-relevant data infrastructures will be established and integrated via open interfaces. Secure data exchange is ensured through the use of International Data Spaces (IDS) standards. In a further step, users will be supported in choosing the best possible response strategy. The selected response measures of individual actors will be transmitted to the PAIRS platform in anonymized form.
BMWK AI flagship project
The research project is funded as an AI flagship initiative by the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action (BMWK) with approximately €10 million. The focus is on production, logistics and supply chain management, as well as healthcare and energy supply. The aim is to bring the initiative to market maturity as quickly as possible so it can be deployed across Europe and worldwide.
A strong foundation
Advaneo GmbH leads the consortium, which includes ten additional partners: Fraunhofer IPA, FIR e.V. at RWTH Aachen University, the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI), the Federal Agency for Technical Relief (THW), Bisping Medizintechnik GmbH, SICK AG, Tiplu GmbH, OFFIS e.V., IBM Deutschland GmbH, and Saarland University – Chair of Legal Informatics. You can find all other essential information in the information sections of this website.
More information on the PAIRS project: www.pairs-projekt.de
