Today physical security equipment and systems are very diverse in technology, concept of operations, application areas and performance. Similar security products are difficult to compare in terms of performance, accuracy, usage, trust and validation of functionality. Currently, there are very few certification procedures in Europe mutually recognized by differentMember States. This leads to fragmentation of the market, as identified in the recent EC Communication on Security Industrial Policy, with negative impacts on both suppliers and users.HECTOS will study if and how existing evaluation and certification schemes used in other areas including Common Criteria, New Legislative Framework, ECAC CEP, CertAlarm etc. could be used and possibly further developed/enhanced/adapted/integrated as a general approach for the assessment and certification of products used for physical security of people and infrastructure. As well as mechanisms to independently evaluate security product performance, on a scientifically valid and statistically reliable basis, the project will consider ethical and privacy requirements and regulatory compliance. The approach will be validated through experiments using two different product groups as case studies: weapons and explosives detection systems (outside of aviation security) and biometric recognition. The project will develop a roadmap for the development of new harmonized certification schemes and provide standardization bodies with proposals for new work items.HECTOS will establish expert and user groups from industry, regulators, standards bodies and end-users in order to gather requirements, seek input on direction and priorities, communicate and build consensus in the results of the work.