Progress Report (2022)

Aspects of security-relevant research and related ethical issues are increasingly coming into focus, among other things due to advances in research on artificial intelligence and pandemic pathogens, as well as scientific entanglements with states in which human rights violations and other violations of rule-of-law principles are observed. This is reflected in the fourth Progress Report of the Joint Committee on the Handling of Security-Relevant Research. The report provides an overview of the state of international debates on selected research fields, legal frameworks and funding requirements. Furthermore, the activities of the Committees and Officers for Ethics in Security-Relevant Research established at 120 research institutions throughout Germany are described, as well as the contributions of the Joint Committee to public debates.