Fraunhofer FKIE News

Securing the future viability and technological innovation of the German Armed Forces, these core tasks are embedded in the military science research carried out at the Wachtberg office in North Rhine-Westphalia. Fraunhofer FKIE has had a number of different guises over the years: it started out as FFM, FAT, and IFE, was then one of three institutes incorporated into FGAN, finally becoming known as Fraunhofer FKIE in 2009. For 60 years, its scientists have been conducting research into the defe...

The Ukraine conflict confirms that wars are also fought in urban environments. Russia is mainly aiming its attacks at the neighboring country’s large city centers. Reliable, technology-supported reconnaissance is a key factor in gaining the upper hand here. Sensors are an important resource for this. Classifying gunshots and drones Researchers at the Fraunhofer Institute for Communication, Information Processing, and Ergonomics FKIE are looking into the ways that the systems can provide...

The European Commission has published the projects selected under the 2022 European Defense Fund (EDF). The SWAT-SHOAL project, funded with 25 million euros, has been selected in the category of Underwater Warfare. SoS development The project aims to develop and implement the concept of a System of Systems (SoS) that integrates different types of manned and unmanned vehicles in a swarm to achieve greater efficiency in underwater missions, such as surveillance, reconnaissance, mine warfare, co...

The German Navy is making advances in the digitalization of its core processes. For many years now, the Fraunhofer Institute for Communication, Information Processing and Ergonomics FKIE has been providing scientific and technical support in this area. The Defense Technology Institute, based in Wachtberg, Germany, has focused its research on digitalization in defense and security. Now, in a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) the Navy Command and Fraunhofer FKIE have agreed to further expand th...

The aim of the lokik project, whose name is a shortened form of the German for “local initial crisis management,” is to create an independent communication network and a flexible picture of the situations that arise in the acute phases of disasters. Scientists from the Fraunhofer Institute for Communication, Information Processing, and Ergonomics FKIE have been working to achieve this since the night in 2021 when Germany’s Ahr Valley experienced a devastating flood. In spring...

It's a record: for the first time, a total of 14 teams will compete in the European Robotics Hackathon (EnRicH) from 12 to 16 June 2023-more than ever before. On the site of the nuclear power plant Zwentendorf near Vienna, which never went into operation, participants from Austria and Germany, but also from Poland, Finland and even Canada, will test the current state of their robotic systems. They all face the challenging scenarios developed by the Fraunhofer Institute for Communication, Inform...

The Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn and Fraunhofer FKIE will host the world-renowned Digital Forensic Research Workshop in March. The conference will bring together experts from around the world to discuss current and emerging challenges in digital forensics. Broad thematic scope The Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn and the Fraunhofer Institute for Communication, Information Processing, and Ergonomics FKIE are proud to host the esteemed Di...

The list of "CPWG Interoperability Heroes" recently included their names: Martin Lies and David Dahlberg, scientists from the "Communication Systems" department at the Fraunhofer Institute for Communication, Information Processing and Ergonomics FKIE, have been honored with this exceptional distinction for their many years of involvement in several committees of Federated Mission Networking (FMN). The FMN initiative was founded in 2015 with the aim of improving interoperability betwee...

Planning has already been underway since the summer: For the fourth time, the Fraunhofer Institute for Communication, Information Processing, and Ergonomics FKIE is organizing the European Robotics Hackathon (EnRicH) together with the Austrian Armaments and Defence Technology Agency (ARWT). EnRicH 2023 EnRicH will take place in June 2023. For about a week, teams from all over the world will come together near Vienna to check the current development status of their robotic systems in vario...

The NATO Science and Technology Organization (STO) has honored Dr. Michael Wunder, Head of the Research Department 'Information Technology for Command and Control Systems' (ITF) at Fraunhofer FKIE, with the NATO STO Excellence Award 2022. The organization recognizes his outstanding contributions to the Information Systems Technology (IST) Panel, which the engineer and scientist most recently led for eight years as Vice-Chair and Chair. Emerging technologies "Dr. Michael Wunder's dedicated con...

Large-scale and prolonged power outages, waste piling up as waste disposal ceases to function, disruptions to water or gas supplies, and successful cyber attacks on critical infrastructures, especially the power grid, can have serious consequences.  Holistically conceived cyber security is necessary to prevent such scenarios. As part of the Fraunhofer Center for Digital Energy, Fraunhofer FKIE is working with partners to increase IT security and make the sector resilient to attacks....

First place in the Femtec Award 2022 for Macarena Varela, a Scientist at the Fraunhofer Institute for Communication, Information Processing, and Ergonomics FKIE. In the category 'Innovation' she prevailed in public voting and accepted the award from Femtec Managing Director Marion Zeßner at the Femtec summer party in Berlin. In the category 'Leadership', Prof. Dr. Angela Ittel, President of the TU Braunschweig, was awarded, and the prize in the category 'Social Impact' went to the DokFo...

A prestigious award for the Fraunhofer Institute for Communication, Information Processing and Ergonomics FKIE: The NATO Civil-Military Cooperation Centre of Excellence (CCOE) has presented the Wachtberg-based institute with the 'CIMIC Award of Excellence 2021' in recognition of its extensive efforts to strengthen civil-military cooperation. cIMIC Award of Excellence On the occasion of its tenth anniversary in 2017, the CCOE in The Hague launched the 'CIMIC Award of Excellence'. Since then, th...

Airbus Defense and Space, the German prime for the tri-national Future Combat Air System Program (FCAS), has contracted Fraunhofer FKIE and DMI Solutions to develop an Explainable AI (XAI) demonstrator. The project is realized jointly with the FCAS Expert Commission on the responsible use of new technologies. Airbus Defense and Space, the German prime for the tri-national Future Combat Air System Program (FCAS), has contracted Fraunhofer FKIE and DMI Solutions to develop an Explainable AI (XAI)...

Drones equipped with microphone arrays will help rescue workers in disaster areas to find and rescue survivors more quickly. They will detect cries for help and signals from buried victims from the air and simultaneously pinpoint their location. Macarena Varela, a scientist at the Fraunhofer Institute for Communication, Information Processing and Ergonomics FKIE, is developing this technology to help victims in situations where every second counts. Equipped with Latest technology Varela descr...

The second phase of the Modifiable Underwater Mothership (MUM) project has now been initiated, following the handing down of a funding decision by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy. In the presence of all six partner organizations, Norbert Brackmann, the German government's coordinator for the maritime industry, presented the funding notification at the thyssenkrupp Marine Systems shipyard in Kiel. Alexander Nies of the Fraunhofer FKIE Cyber Analysis & Defense Depa...

Dr. Alexander Charlish is the first Fraunhofer scientist to be awarded the prestigious IEEE Radar Research Prize. He is the first Fraunhofer researcher and the second German ever to receive the prestigious IEEE Fred Nathanson Memorial Radar Award. Dr. Alexander Charlish, a scientist and team pioneer at Fraunhofer FKIE, received the international award for his outstanding work in the field of radar resource management and cognitive radar. Since 1985, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics E...

Artificial intelligence and journalistic expertise are the basis of a disinformation detection system developed and implemented in a collaboration between press relations, NewsGuard, and the Fraunhofer Institute for Communication, Information Processing, and Ergonomics FKIE. First use case A qualitative analysis of media coverage of the 2020 US election. The analysis reveals that Donald Trump’s media dominance over his challenger Joe Biden was due primarily to the spread of fake news and...

The Bundeswehr plans to equip its infantry with unmanned ground vehicles for the transport of material and weapons. It has tested various off-the-shelf systems in a variety of operational scenarios as part of two troop exercises. The Fraunhofer FKIE provided technical and scientific support for the tests. The results demonstrate the high potential of unmanned ground vehicles (UGVs) and the level of maturity they have already attained. The conclusion among soldiers and experts was unanimous: the...

Alarming findings are published in the 'Home Router Security Report 2020' by the Fraunhofer Institute for Communication, Information Processing and Ergonomics FKIE. Of the 127 home routers tested by seven major manufacturers, nearly all were found to have security flaws, some of them very severe.  security flaws The problems range from missing security updates to easily decrypted, hard-coded passwords and known vulnerabilities that should have been patched long ago. A team led by Peter...

Purchasing, production, logistics, distribution, and markets form a network spread over continents and nations, the details of which are difficult for companies to keep track of. However, such an overview with a focus on one's own company contributes to the company's success in many ways. FIFI project The project, 'Fraud Information-Fusion Intelligence' by Fraunhofer FKIE adapts proven approaches, procedures, and tools used by security authorities to the requirements of companies, develops t...

In the frame of the Future Combat Air System (FCAS), Airbus and Fraunhofer FKIE have created an independent panel of experts on the responsible use of new technologies to define and propose ethical as well as international legal 'guard rails' for Europe’s largest defense project. The expert panel, which was first initiated in Germany in 2019, currently includes stakeholders such as the German Ministry of Defence, the German Ministry of Foreign Affairs, foundations, univers...

Fire on board! This is a grave danger for any ship, but especially so when a ship is ostensibly safely docked in the harbor, where 'normal' firefighters are on duty and have to cope with the special challenges on board a ship. Firefighters’ safety Since 2005, 44 potentially disastrous incidents have occurred in German ports alone, including 15 fires and 13 spills of hazardous materials. EFAS, a joint project coordinated by the Fraunhofer Institute for Communication, Information Processi...

For his Master's thesis - 'File system fuzzing applied to the BSD operating system family', Christopher Krah, a Graduate of the Department of Computer Science at the Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn and a Scientist in the Applied System Analysis research group at the Fraunhofer Institute for Communication, Information Processing, and Ergonomics FKIE since July, was awarded the first prize in the AFCEA Academic Award 2019, endowed with 5,000 Euros. File systems...

Drones have ushered in a new dimension to airborne attacks and increasingly confront security agencies (referred to collectively in German as BOS) with new challenges. Drone incidents at the London Gatwick, London Heathrow, and Frankfurt/Main airports have brought operations at three of the largest European airports to a temporary halt, all within six months.  Counter the threat of drones There is also a real possibility of attacks targeting critical Infrastructure and major events in li...

The close cooperation between the Bundeswehr Cyber and Information Space Command (KdoCIR) and the Fraunhofer Institute for Communication, Information Processing and Ergonomics FKIE is based on a new foundation. Major General Juergen Setzer, deputy inspector of the Cyber and Information Space Command, and Professor Dr. Peter Martini, director of the Fraunhofer FKIE, have now signed an agreement to collaborate even more closely in the field of cyber security. KdoCIR and the Fraunhofer FKIE Comm...