Sustaining key skills in the UK naval industry — 21 July 2008

To preserve its ability to design, build and support complex warships and submarines, the UK's Ministry of Defence (MOD) asked RAND Europe for help with identifying labour implications for its shipbuilding programme. Research indicates that MOD will need to preserve and sustain several key technical skills, especially detailed designers and professional engineers for various stages of surface ship and submarine acquisition and support.

Although MOD has taken into account the requirement for these skills, its future maritime programme is likely to have to undergo modification or be augmented in order to sustain these technical skills in the long term.

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Radicalization or Rehabilitation — 15 April 2008

This study seeks to provide a preliminary overview of the challenges posed by radicalized and extremist prisoners, and to explore the potential for the radicalization of young European Muslims in the prison environment. The study draws on the body of existing prison theory literature, historical case examples and contemporary open sources. It draws a number of conclusions about the potential in prison for extremist activity, including radicalization, and highlights a number of areas where further research and action may be desirable. The report's key conclusions are:

• It is currently difficult to assess the extent to which radicalization is occurring in prisons
• The radicalization of prisoners is not a new or unique to the contemporary security environment and insights can be gained from historical precedents
• Imprisonment may enhance an individual's vulnerability to radicalization
• Radicalization of other inmates is one of many activities which extremists may undertake in prison
• A greater understanding of how radicalization and contemporary extremists operate in prisons is required
• Housing extremist prisoners is a complex issue
• "De-radicalization" of prisoners may be possible but requires greater assessment
• Preventative and resettlement initiatives should be given consideration alongside measures implemented within the prison environment

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Understanding how UK military personnel view their pay and allowance package — 13 November 2007

UK military personnel are being deployed on operations more frequently than any time in recent history. With recruitment and retention key policy issues for the Ministry of Defence, RAND Europe has studied the motivational impact of the current remuneration packages for serving personnel and new recruits.

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Security Challenges to the Use and Deployment of Disruptive Technologies — 30 January 2007

RAND Europe recently completed a study, commissioned by DG Information Society & Media of the European Commission, assessing the security challenges involved in the use and deployment of so-called 'disruptive technologies.' These technologies were: Voice Over Internet Protocol (VoIP), Trusted Computing, Wireless Microwave Access (WiMAX), Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) and Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6). Methods used in the study included expert review, case study examination and evaluation at an expert workshop.</p>Findings showed that some challenges were common to all technologies, most notably those surrounding the business case for their implementation, while others were technology-specific. The study was the latest in a series conducted for the European Commission in the area of Network and Information Security.

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Violent Jihad and the UK: Suicide Terrorism in Context — 14 November 2006

On November 3rd 2006 the Royal United Services Institution (RUSI) hosted a Workshop on the theme of "Understanding Suicide Terrorism". It was well attended, with over two hundred and twenty representatives from the police, military, UK and foreign governments, academics, NGOs and the press. Dr. Lindsay Clutterbuck, Research Leader from the Defence and Security team at RAND Europe, contributed to the days events by giving a presentation entitled "Violent Jihad and the UK: Suicide Terrorism in Context". In it he outlined the role individuals from the UK had played in the evolution of suicide terrorism over the last twenty five years and how their justification for doing so may have had a bearing on their subsequent actions.

Download Presentation (Word document)Workshop Description (www.rusi.org)

RAND Europe Researchers Develop an Online Cyber-crime Tool — 27 February 2006

RAND Europe has developed an easy-to-use online tool that facilitates exchange of information among organisations in European Union (EU) member states, when they need to access national legislation on cyber-crime. The database contains information relating to cyber-crime law in each country and a list of relevant laws and provisions related to a common classification system of incidents.

The project, sponsored by the European Commission's Directorate General (DG) Information Society and Media, allows computer security incident response teams and information security experts to search and view relevant information in cases where security has been breached. For more information contact Neil Robinson (neilr@rand.org).

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