Lauri Aasmann joined panel discussion „European Capacity Building as a Cyber Union?” focusing on steps that the European Union has taken to enhance its cyber capacity building efforts in its direct neighborhood and beyond. The panel examined and compared recent collaborations and provided critical insights into the effectiveness and accountability of the European Cyber Foreign and Security Policy in promoting cyber resilience globally.

During the panel, Lauri Aasmann was providing his insights based on the practical experiences of the implementer of the cyber capacity building projects. Offering his vision of the most important areas of development aid in cyber, he explained that, in addition to situational awareness of countries, training of critical infrastructure operators and testing of theoretical knowledge in cyber exercises are crucial.

Furthermore, he discussed long-lasting shortage of cyber experts, the methodology of assessing countries cyber-readiness and the multitude of cyber capacity building initiatives sponsored by the EU. This provided an opportunity to introduce the EU CyberNet Expert Pool,  project’s Mapping Initiative and various cyber security indexes measuring the cyber maturity of countries, especially in Latin America and the Caribbean in the context of our LAC4 training facility.

Hosted by European Repository of Cyber Incidents (EuRepoC), an independent and interdisciplinary research consortium dedicated to evidence-based analysis of the cyber conflict landscape, in cooperation with TECH:RISK, a project focused on the role of private companies in providing state cyber security, the conference was intended to enable European policy makers, senior officials, and senior fellows to discuss in a frank but confidential manner the effectiveness and accountability of the European Cyber Foreign and Security Policy.

The conference introduced fascinating initiative of European Repository of Cyber Incidents, a data-driven research documenting and making visible information about cyber operations. The discussions touched upon Europe’s cyber insecurity and increasing relevance of cybersecurity for the EU’s foreign and security policy. The need for better situational awareness on adversaries operational capabilities, and for more cyber expertise was voiced.