On 1 and 2 December 2022, the final conference of the joint fundamental research project “Making Transparent the Invisible Surveillance” (MATIS) took place in-person at the University of Luxembourg’s Weicker building in Kirchberg.
The conference “Digital Investigative measures – towards empirical legal assessment?” was co-organised by the University of Luxembourg and the Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB). Funding for the project was provided by the Luxembourg National Research Fund (FNR) and the Research Foundation Flanders (FWO).
The two-day conference featured over 30 speakers, including Prof. Katalin Ligeti (Dean of the Faculty of Law, Economics and Finance), Prof. Mark Cole, Prof. Stanislaw Tosza and PhD students Angelica Fernandez and Juraj Sajfert from the University of Luxemburg, as well as Prof. Paul De Hert and Prof. Vagelis Papakonstantinou from the Vrije Universiteit Brussel.
This successful conference was divided in two keynote speeches, five panels and a closing roundtable. Furthermore, it provided the many attendees with insights and expertise about the current state of play of digital investigative measures within the scope of MATIS project (data retention, PNR, access to financial data and e-evidence).
In addition, the conference tackled the challenges ahead for law enforcement in the Digital Era, such as the fight against child sexual abuse online. The closing roundtable pin-pointed the concerns, but also offered possible solutions for improved transparency and accountability of law enforcement increasingly relying on new technologies, such as Artificial Intelligence.
