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The virtual, online world is a significant part of everyday life. As a reflection of modern society, it features a range of criminal behaviour. The internet is a complex system of interconnected computer networks allowing applications to communicate with one another. Through this complexity, it has a simplistic structure with a visible top layer, a deeper content layer and finally, a small but significant dark layer. This dark layer, known as the dark web, is a less explored and understood part of ...

In 2025, ransomware – malicious software that demands a ransom – remained a major cybersecurity threat in the EU, impacting individuals as well as the public and private sectors. Recent reports confirm that attack strategies have developed into complex, multilayered software systems that enable malicious actors to evade identification and carry out decentralised attacks. Additionally, artificial intelligence has emerged as a facilitator in both spreading and combating ransomware.

European Council President António Costa declared 2026 'the year of European competitiveness', emphasising the significance that the European Council places on the topic. Given the current geopolitical context, Costa put substantial efforts into maintaining the EU leaders' focus on this agenda point. Despite predictions that competitiveness would be sidelined, the European Council followed up on the discussions at the informal competitiveness retreat at Alden Biesen on 12 February, launching a 'One ...

The European Union increasingly relies on cooperation with non-EU countries to tackle irregular migration, an issue of increasing political importance. However, sending irregular migrants back to their countries of origin or to a transit country depends on the other country agreeing to accept the migrant's readmission. In the 2000s, the EU started concluding readmission agreements with non-EU countries. From 2016, it started to focus on informal readmission deals. These non-legally binding agreements ...

In 2023, the European Commission presented a proposal for a directive on combating corruption to modernise the fragmented EU anti-corruption framework. During the March II plenary session, MEPs are expected to consider the co-legislators' agreement on the proposal, endorsed in committee in January 2026.

European Union Member States have a shared responsibility to give protection to asylum-seekers, to ensure they receive fair treatment and their cases are examined according to uniform standards. The common European asylum system (CEAS) establishes common standards for Member State procedures for granting and withdrawing international protection. A critical aspect of a common approach to international protection is the application of the 'safe country of origin' concept. In the context of refugees ...

From the mid-1980s to the mid-1990s, the European Parliament took a strong stance against racism and xenophobia. Despite the European Communities' lack of formal competence in this area, the Parliament developed several measures with regards to it, driven by an anti-racist Zeitgeist. This study analyses the causes, methods and outcomes of the Parliament's mobilisation. Drawing on the European Parliament's archives, particularly those of the committee of inquiry established in 1989, the analysis reveals ...

The safe third country (STC) concept is well established in international asylum policies. According to the concept, certain migrants should not be granted protection in the country where they have applied for it. Instead, they may be returned, or transferred, to a country where they could have found, or can find, international protection. Amid ongoing EU-level discussions on safe third country rules, in 2018 the United Nations Refugee Agency developed legal considerations on safe third countries ...

• Eurojust, the European Union Agency for Criminal Justice Cooperation, saw a significant rise in cases and operational engagement between 2019 and 2024. • The agency is very effective in assisting national authorities with complex cross-border investigations and prosecutions, especially by providing a neutral platform for coordination, multilingual capability and structured cooperation with partners and third countries. • Overall, national authorities are satisfied with Eurojust's work. However, ...

An organised police force designed for the safety and protection of the public is something that is familiar throughout Europe. The principles of modern policing, first established almost 200 years ago, continue today but in a vastly different, rapidly changing social environment. Across the EU, police forces have different structures, but the tasks carried out by police officers are by and large the same. The individual officers who make up each police force encounter similar scenarios in their ...