We are seeking a student research assistant to support us with our projects. We have several ongoing projects in which you could work with us and at the same time widen your knowledge of interdisciplinary research and the use of statistical methods in the social sciences. If you are a student and because of the war in Ukraine, you had to leave your university and found refuge in Berlin or Potsdam you are more than welcome to apply.

Illicit trade is often considered in terms of shadowy, small-scale, informal merchants and the costs of such activities, when considered beyond lost profits to intellectual property holders at all, are typically thought of via the lens of national accounting. In this policy paper, the authors consider the effects on the overall economic activity and show that marginal increases in illicit trade are associated with reductions in economic growth, tertiary education enrolment and in research and development spending.

2021 was not a particularly good year for the IT departments of German local authorities. The best-known and probably most serious cyber incident was the attack on the Anhalt-Bitterfeld district. Until now, however, there has been no governmental, nationwide body that systematically records and analyzes (successful) cyberattacks on local authorities. In the new BIGS Essenz, an attempt is made to shed some light into the black box of cyberattacks on municipal administrations by examining 27 cyberattacks on German municipal administrations in the period from January to December 2021. The publication is only available in German.