News about Strengthening trust and security

The European Parliament, the Council and the European Commission have just reached a political agreement on the Cybersecurity Act which reinforces the mandate of the EU Agency for Cybersecurity, (European Union Agency for Network and Information and Security, ENISA) so as to better support Member States with tackling cybersecurity threats and attacks. The Act also establishes an EU framework for cybersecurity certification, boosting the cybersecurity of online services and consumer devices.

The European Commission and the High Representative have proposed a wide range of concrete measures that will further strengthen the EU’s cybersecurity structures and capabilities with more cooperation between the Member States and the different EU structures concerned. These measures will ensure that the EU is better prepared to face the ever-increasing cybersecurity challenges.

At the Telecoms Council of 4 December, the EU ministers adopted a partial general approach on the Digital Europe Programme. Building on the Digital Single Market strategy, launched in May 2015, and its achievements over the past years, the European Commission proposed in June 2018 to create the first ever Digital Europe Programme and invest €9.2 billion in tomorrow's digital technologies as part of the next long-term EU budget 2021-2027.

If you want to discover the impact that digital technologies have on eGovernment, as well as on health and care, then you can attend the “Digital Citizen” panel discussion taking place at ICT 2018.

The Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) Telecom call on cybersecurity has just closed. 49 project proposals have been submitted by transport and energy companies, ICT firms, ministries and national organisations from 19 EU Member States. The applicants are proposing an overall investment of 28 million euros to improve their operational capabilities in cybersecurity, of which 18.3 million euros have been requested to be co-financed by the European Union. The EU budget dedicated for this call was 13 million euros.

Today the European Commission published a new study, the eGovernment benchmark report 2018, which demonstrates that the availability and quality of online public services have improved in the EU. Overall there has been significant progress in respect to the efficient use of public information and services online, transparency of government authorities' operations and users' control of personal data, cross-border mobility and key enablers, such as the availability of electronic identity cards and other documents.

Three online campaigns highlighting the importance of staying safe online have been rewarded by the European Commission.

The EU Blockchain Roundtable: "Bringing industries together for Europe to lead in blockchain technologies" took place on 20 November in Brussels in presence of the Commissioner for Digital Economy and Society, Mariya Gabriel and the Director-General for Communications Networks, Content and Technology, Roberto Viola. The Roundtable's objective is to gather support among EU industry leaders and policy makers for a comprehensive EU strategy to boost innovation and exploitation of blockchain technology.

Does your organisation want to test eID and trust service solutions before making an investment? Would you like to fully understand the business benefits for your organisation?

As part of the eIDAS Toolkit for SMEs, the eIDAS Made Easy Guidebook and eIDAS Checklist have recently been launched to help businesses to understand the benefits of electronic identification (eID) and trust services and guide them towards implementation, according to individual business needs.