The UK-led European Union Naval Force (EU NAVFOR) off the coast of Somalia has joined forces with an IT services company Polymorph to develop a collaboration tool that will allow the various navies to communicate securely in real time.

The tool will help vessels operating under the same EU NAVFOR anti-piracy action to exchange critical information in a secure manner and coordinate anti-piracy missions.

The new tool will enable vessels to overcome current IT and communication systems limitations by providing secure, real-time communication capabilities and document sharing over a single secure framework.

EU NAVFOR spokesperson said that having reviewed the first six months of operations, the requirement for a secure collaboration tool, to supercede existing systems was realised.

“We handle sensitive information and needed a secure and fully integrated solution that would help us not only establish better communication between the various international military vessels present in the Horn of Africa, but also gain control over these increasingly complex and disturbing instances,” the spokesperson said.