What is exactly HAWaton, who organizes it, and what is the result of HAWaton?
HAWaton is a competition that promotes information literacy and digital skills of young people with an emphasis on preserving Croatian digital heritage, which took place on March 21, 2023 at the Gymnasium Karlovac. The competition was created in cooperation between the National and University Library in Zagreb and the "Ivan Goran Kovačić" City Library Karlovac on the occasion of the anniversary of the birth of the Croatian author Ivan Goran Kovačić. Thus, this competition is an opportunity for the City Library "Ivan Goran Kovačić" to celebrate 60 years since it was named after this famous author. The National and University Library in Zagreb participates in the organization through the departments of the Croatian Web Archive (abbreviated as HAW), User Services, and the European Documentation Center NSK, with partners Europe direct Karlovac, Gymnasium Karlovac and European Commission Representation in Croatia.
The main theme of HAWaton is "Ivan Goran Kovačić", and the contestants will collect online content that describes the character and work of the aforementioned writer. The final product of HAWaton is the creation and publication of a digital thematic collection on the Croatian web archive of the National and University Library in Zagreb. The content of the collection will refer to the character and work of the aforementioned writer, and it was the participants of HAWaton who were the main creators of the content. The thematic collection will be published in open access and available to all future researchers who will be interested in the life of Ivan Goran Kovačić.
Students from three classes of Gymnasium Karlovac competed in HAWaton, and the winners were those who collected the largest number of the most accurate online content about Ivan Goran Kovačić within the given time limit. Its winners pointed out that the competition was an educational but also a fun experience for them, and they also received valuable prizes, while the other contestants received consolation prizes.

On the occasion of the anniversary of the birth of the Croatian author Ivan Goran Kovačić, the City Library “Ivan Goran Kovačić” Karlovac in cooperation with the National and University Library in Zagreb on 21 March 2023 is organising HAWaton — a competition of high school students in collecting online content. The competition will be held in Karlovac High School, and the task of participants will be to search, evaluate and select web pages related to the character and work of Ivan Goran Kovačić. Participants will, for a limited period of time, collect links to the web pages using computers, while respecting the selection criteria for cataloguing and archiving in the Croatian Web Archives.

This participative way of learning and gathering information in which the general public is involved, which is overseen by experts, is called civic science, represents the level of crowdsourcing, i.e. the work of the crowd.

The objectives of HAWaton are:

• • Information literacy of young people
• • Fostering the development of digital skills
• • Developing Critical Thinking
• • Popularisation of digital library services
• • Promoting concepts of mass support in the context of civic science.

Three classes of Karlovac Gymnasium will participate in HAWaton, and each class will receive one winner, i.e. the person who has collected the largest number of the most accurate online content about Ivan Goran Kovačić in due time. The winners of HAWaton expect valuable prizes that will be awarded at the school library of Karlovac Gymnasium the same day after classes.

The final product of HAWaton will be the production and publication of the thematic collection “Ivan Goran Kovačić” on the Croatian Web Archives. The content of the collection will refer to the character and work of the aforementioned writer, and it is the participants of the HAWaton that will be the main creators of the content. The thematic collection will be published in open access and available to all future researchers interested in the life of Ivan Goran Kovačić.

The National and University Library in Zagreb participates in the organisation through the departments of the Croatian Web Archives (abbreviated by HAW), the Customer Service and the European Documentation Centre. Partners organised by HAWaton are the Karlovac Gymnasium, the Representation of the European Commission in the Republic of Croatia and Europe Direct Karlovac.

This is an event and an opportunity for the Ivan Goran Kovačić City Library to celebrate 60 years since it was named after this famous author.

An upgraded Schengen Information System (SIS) has started to operate today. SIS is Europe’s largest information exchange system for security and border management. It contains information on wanted or missing persons, third-country nationals who do not have a legal right to stay in the Union and lost or stolen objects (e.g. cars, firearms, vessels and identity documents).

The upgraded SIS is the cornerstone of the world’s most advanced border management system. Together with the Entry/Exit System (EES) and the European Travel Information and Authorisation System (ETIAS), SIS is part of an interoperable architecture.

The improved SIS is being improved to include new alert categories, biometric data such as palm prints, fingerprints and DNA records for missing persons, as well as additional tools to fight crime and terrorism. Improvements are important as they provide preventive warnings to protect vulnerable people and deter irregular migration. These improvements aim to provide more complete and reliable information to improve security and border management.

Enhanced Features:

• • Improved information exchange and cooperation:New alert categories and more data will be shared through SIS, ensuring that more complete and reliable information is available. Clearer rules and improved structures for the exchange of information through national contact points (the SIRENE Bureaux) have been introduced.
• • New possibilities for locating and identifying wanted persons and strengthening external border controls:In addition to photographs and fingerprints, SIS will also contain new types of biometric data (palm prints, fingerprints and palm prints and DNA records for missing persons) and other information to locate and identify persons registered in the system.
• • Additional tools to fight crime and terrorism:New alerts on inquiry checks will allow national authorities to collect targeted information on suspects of serious crime or terrorism. For example, identification documents and car information used by suspects will be stored in SIS. There will be alerts on “unknown wanted persons” containing only fingerprints of unknown perpetrators from the locations of terrorist offences or serious crime.
• • Additional tools to protect missing and vulnerable persons:National authorities will be able to issue preventive alerts in the system to protect certain categories of vulnerable persons (children at risk of abduction or potential victims of terrorism, trafficking in human beings, gender-based violence or armed conflicts/crimes), in addition to existing alerts on missing persons.
• • Additional tools to prevent and deter irregular migrationReturn decisions will be part of the information exchanged in the system in order to improve the effective implementation of those decisions. Member States will have to enter an alert in SIS whenever they issue a return decision to third-country nationals who do not have a legal right to stay in the EU, allowing them to actively monitor whether the returnee leaves the territory of the EU effectively, paving the way for the mutual recognition of return decisions among Member States, as proposed by President von der Leyen ahead of the February European Council.
• • Increased use of SIS by EU agencies:Europol and national immigration authorities now have access to all alert categories in SIS. Operational teams of the European Border and Coast Guard Agency (Frontex) have been granted access to SIS (implementation is still ongoing).

 

SIS has strict data quality and protection requirements. The system only contains data on persons and objects sought by EU countries and Schengen Associated Countries. National authorities monitor the application of data protection rules in their respective countries, while the European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS) monitors how data protection rules apply in the Central System managed by eu-LISA.