Additional information by themes
Multi-professional collaboration
Multi-professional collaboration is a process that involves professionals from several fields. The work has a shared goal, decision-making possibilities and the responsibility to support the client. This means that all the participants are responsible for the outcome of the work and everybody’s views are taken into consideration in decision-making.
Multi-professional collaboration has been found to have positive effects on the client. According to previous research, multi-professional activities produce services that better address the client’s needs, reduce inequality between clients and strengthen collaboration between the stakeholders. They have also been found to strengthen the client’s positive behaviour. Adolescents have felt that multi-professional support reduces stress and improves their ability to cope with their daily lives. They have also reported that multi-professional services have strengthened their ability to think and to approach problems systematically. Multi-professionally produced services have increased adolescents’ experience of being appreciated and being entitled to expert services. For them, multi-professional services have offered the possibility to receive support and information about other services available, as well as how they can participate in them. Adolescents have considered multi-professionally produced services most efficient when their parents have also had the opportunity to participate in the services.
Multi-professional collaboration has also been found to be of use to professionals and organisations. It strengthens collaboration and interaction between stakeholders and deepens an understanding of the tasks, roles and working methods of other professionals. In addition, multi-professional collaboration has increased work commitment and motivation as well as job satisfaction.
- Multi-professional cooperation in Anchor work is governed by legislation. The aim is to ensure early intervention, promote wellbeing and prevent crime, with a focus on the adolescent, whose individual resources are supported through multi-professional collaboration.
- Anchor work is an integral part of preventive actions by the police4. However, it is not limited to this alone, as the work is multi-professional and multi-sectoral based on a collaboration scheme where the various fields occupy equal positions.
- Adolescents need seamless services available in a single place, with a genuine opportunity to participate in decision-making concerning them. The purpose of the Anchor team is to survey the overall situation of the adolescent and their family and provide purposeful service referral. The collaboration field in Anchor work is broad, covering stakeholders from the adolescent’s close relatives to schools, associations and different municipal stakeholders. Multi-professional support for the adolescent takes place in relation to the opportunities, ethics and legislation of society.
Violent radicalisation and extremism
Violent extremism is a form of extremism that uses or threatens to use violence, or encourages or justifies the use of violence based on a world view, or on ideological grounds. The world view or ideology can be politically or religiously motivated or built around a single topic, but it inherently involves the use of violence to achieve the goals. In its most radical form, violent extremism can turn into terrorism.
In this manual, violent radicalisation means an individual process in which the person uses or threatens to use violence, encourages the use of violence or justifies its use on the basis of a world view of ideology. The root causes for violent radicalisation are multiple, and there is no single reason or form of violent radicalisation.
The best way to prevent violent radicalisation and extremism is through preventive collaboration involving various authorities.
Further information about violent extremism and radicalisation
There are several websites and online guides related to different sectors that deal with violent extremism and radicalisation.
In Finland, the Ministry of the Interior supervises and coordinates preventive work in the field of violent extremism and radicalisation Violent radicalisation – Ministry of the Interior (intermin.fi)
Healthcare and social welfare Radicalisation and extremism, Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare
Educational services: Violent extremism | Finnish National Agency for Education (oph.fi)
Children and young people
RadicalWeb project • Save the Children
Information about Exit activities focusing on deradicalisation: Exit-toiminta tavoitteena irti väkivallasta | Deaconess Institute (hdl.fi)
The European Union’s Radicalisation Awareness Network provides information about themes related to radicalisation: Radicalisation Awareness Network (RAN) (europa.eu)
Information networks and cybercrime
Cybercrime includes crime carried out or involving the computer, information network or network equipment. As a result of the global digitalisation trend, society’s operations, services and communication now rely on information networks, which has accelerated the growth of cybercrime. The goals of cybercrime are the same as those of traditional crime, but the methods of implementation are electronic. Examples of cybercrime are blackmail, theft, fraud, spying, money laundering and forgery. Most cybercrime is mundane in nature, including fraud targeting the user accounts of individuals (e.g. Flubot malware), and the stolen information is actively used for criminal purposes such as blackmail and identity theft. The main threat related to cybercrime comes from cyber attacks on critical infrastructure such as ransomware attacks on distribution chains.
The ‘cyber’ prefix refers to activities related to information networks or data devices. In terms of form, cybercrime usually refers to crime connected to information networks and that target and are carried out using the information network environment. For example, data hacking focuses on valuable electronic data and is often carried out in preparation of financial or ideologically motivated crime. The goal of a denial of service attack is to paralyse an activity, such as a service, using automated tools. File encryption and blackmail carried out with malware can cause considerable damage and inconvenience if successful.
Just like cybercrime, cyber criminals come in various types. Today, the transition from traditional crime to cybercrime is relatively easy, as crime can be committed by purchasing ready, easy-to-use software or by ordering a crime from another criminal better acquainted with the online environment. The internet also offers a low-threshold platform for children and adolescents testing cybercrime, who usually do not start out with financial motives and who usually do not have a prior background in crime or have not shown a criminal tendency.
From the criminal’s perspective, cybercrime has the advantage of not being bound to a specific location, meaning that the crime can be committed nearly anywhere and at any time, which reduces the risk of being seen. Online, a skilled person can also avoid leaving traces more efficiently than in the physical world, which is felt to reduce the risk of being caught. Aspects of the available technology, such as speed and easy access to data, also have an impact. Children and young people can find very detailed instructions online for committing cybercrime, and they do not necessarily understand the scope of damage the action can cause or its consequences.
There is also a huge number of potential victims online. In view of the increase in cybercrime, the competence of internet users is developing too slowly, making many of them potential victims. The most effective way to prevent cybercrime is to preventively increase awareness of computers and networks and provide young people with information about the differences between legal and illegal activities online, as well as the consequences of criminal activities to themselves, others and society at large (e.g. interruptions in critical operations). Incipient crime behaviour can be influenced by steering the interest and actions of people drawn to the development of IT skills and crime towards alternatives that are positive for both the individuals and society.
Further information about cybercrime:
Further information about cybercrime and cyber security is available on the websites of different operators.
Police: Police What is cybercrime?
The seductions of cybercrime: Adolescence and the thrills of digital transgression (Goldsmith & Wall 2022): https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/1477370819887305
Identify, Intervene, Inspire (NCA): https://directionforbedfordshire.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/CREST-NCA-Cyber- Crime-Report.pdf
Youth pathways into cybercrime (Europol) (2026): https://www.europol.europa.eu/cms/sites/default/files/documents/pathways-white- paper.pdf
Ministry of the Interior: Ministry of the Interior Information networks and crime
Victim Support Finland: Victim Support Finland Cybercrime takes many forms
National Cyber Security Centre: National Cyber Security Centre Current information security phenomena, Cyber Weather
National Crime Agency (UK): NCA Helping Young People to Pursue Careers in Cybersecurity, Not Cybercrime
Europol: Europol Youth Pathways Into Cybercrime (2016)
Europol 2021: IOCTA Internet Organized Crime Threat Assessment
CC-DRIVER research project funded by the EU: CC-DRIVER Researching Cybercriminality to Design New Methods to Prevent, Investigate, and Mitigate Cybercriminal Behaviour