On July 30, 2025, VANGUARD participated in the ERADICATING II Simulation Exercise on Strengthening Europe’s Response to Human Trafficking, which took place in Athens from October 1-3, 2025. During this simulation exercise, law enforcement, prosecutors, labour inspectors, and civil society organizations have been brought together from across Europe. More than 30 participants worked through a realistic trafficking case, stepping into roles from police officers to victims, exploring detection, victim protection, and prosecution in practice. The main takeaways of this exercise have been the need for multidisciplinary cooperation among key actors, the trauma-informed support to survivors, the need for financial investigations to dismantle networks and the importance of building trust to ensure better outcomes.
VANGUARD, represented by its Coordinator, the M4D group of the MKLab of the Information Technologies Institute (ITI) at the Centre for Research & Technology Hellas (CERTH), presented the project’s main objectives, key planned outcomes, and main achievements thus far. A live demonstration of the VANGUARD ToolSuite developed by the project’s technical partners, incorporating input and feedback from end-user partners (police and border guard authorities) has also been delivered, highlighting how AI can be effectively leveraged to support law enforcement efforts in combating human trafficking. A brief Q&A session allowed the audience to engage with the speakers and learn more about the project, promoting in parallel the upcoming second VANGUARD webinar on 22 October 2025.