On October 1-2 2025, under the AI for Safer Children initiative, the United Nations Interregional Crime and Justice Research Institute (UNICRI), through its Centre for Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Robotics, and the Ministry of Interior of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) conducted a regional training in Bucharest, Romania.
Organized in parallel with the Conseil Européen des Syndicats de Police (CESP) Congress – the European Council of Police Trade Unions – this training brought together 17 law enforcement officials from CESP Member States, including Romania, Lithuania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Spain, Cyprus, Kosovo (observer), North Macedonia, Montenegro, Portugal, and Greece.
During the two-day event, participants explored the capabilities of various AI-based tools and techniques to facilitate each step throughout an investigative workflow, including victim and suspect identification and deepfake detection. They benefited from presentations delivered by numerous guest experts and technology providers, including representatives from Amped Software, Camera Forensics, the Child Rescue Coalition, Magnet Forensics, and Semantics 21.
As one participant from the Romanian Police concluded: “It was a very good training. AI is part of our life and it’s just the beginning. We need to know what tools we can use in order to do our jobs better.”
AI is especially crucial in this field, as the Head of UNICRI’s Centre for AI and Robotics highlighted: “The importance of this work cannot be overstated. Last year alone, tens of millions of reports of child sexual abuse materials were generated globally – numbers that far exceed the capacity of traditional investigative methods. AI is not a silver bullet, but it is a critical enabler. It can help process vast amounts of evidence, reduce backlogs, identify victims faster, and pursue perpetrators across jurisdictions.”
There are currently many accessible AI tools and technology providers eager to collaborate with law enforcement agencies. However, the potential of these resources is often not widely known within the law enforcement community, due to various factors including the rapid pace of AI development, limited resources, and restrictions on sharing classified information.
The AI for Safer Children initiative aims to bridge this gap through its online platform, the AI for Safer Children Global Hub. This platform serves as a centralized resource for law enforcement to access information about over 100 cutting-edge AI tools, regardless of their level of technical expertise or prior experience with such technologies. By following the training, investigators can learn how to effectively utilise the presented tools. The Global Hub also provides guidance on the ethical and responsible implementation of AI in investigations related to child sexual exploitation and abuse.
The AI for Safer Children Global Hub fosters international collaboration and communication and has already engaged over 1,200 investigators from 123 countries. Any country within this network can request specialized training on AI for Safer Children free of charge, including possible follow-up training sessions. The UNICRI Centre for AI and Robotics is committed to sustainable capacity building for law enforcement agencies to leverage the positive potential of frontier technologies in this crucial area of child protection.
For additional information, and to join the Global Hub if you are in law enforcement, please click here.