Cyber security cOmpeteNCe fOr Research anD InnovAtion

Project Information

CONCORDIA

Grant agreement ID: 830927

DOI

10.3030/830927

Project closed

EC signature date 19 December 2018

Start date 1 January 2019

End date 31 March 2023

Funded under

• INDUSTRIAL LEADERSHIP - Leadership in enabling and industrial technologies - Information and Communication Technologies (ICT)

Total cost

€ 15 998 737,50

EU contribution

€ 15 998 737,50

Coordinated by

UNIVERSITAET DER BUNDESWEHR MUENCHEN
Germany

Periodic Reporting for period 3 - CONCORDIA (Cyber security cOmpeteNCe fOr Research anD InnovAtion)

Reporting period: 2022-01-01 to 2023-03-31

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

Europe needs to strengthen its own security capacities to secure digital society, economy, and democracy. It is time to reconquer Europe’s digital sovereignty and autonomy to prevent Europe turning into a digital colony. The vision in CONCORDIA was to build digital ecosystems by joining forces across Europe’s research, industry and public sector and to include all human assets. The cyber security (CS) competences are geographically and technically fragmented across Europe, with problem specific development of CS solutions. Europe needs to build its own IT champions out of digital ecosystems. CONCORDIA addresses this by building a European secure, resilient and trusted ecosystem for innovation in CS. CONCORDIA was growing consortium and at the end consisted of 56 partners from industry and research. Building the ecosystem means to understand that all stakeholders have their KPIs, bridging among them, and fostering the development of European IT products and solutions along the whole supply chain. CONCORDIA has provided a blueprint for building digital ecosystems, bridging between communities, foster growth of IT champions to assure that Europe is gaining its digital sovereignty. Even more, Europe should strive for becoming a digital power.

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

CONCORDIA started on 1/1/2019. All work packages (WPs) run in parallel. We briefly describe main results and highlights. More information can be found on the website. WP1 aim was to build a European secure, resilient, and trusted ecosystem for innovation in the area of CS. CONCORDIA published more than 320 papers exceeding the initial objective. Close collaboration with the 3 pilots led to the organization of schools on cs (>240 workshop, conference, and journal papers, 3 Internet RFCs, 1 Internet draft). WP2 comprises 5 sector-specific “pilots”. Threat Intelligence Platform (TIP) for telecom sector and finance sector, privacy and security in e-health sector, security of unmanned aerial systems and cs in supply chain of automotive sector. WP2 successfully established collaborations with WP1 cs experts. To ensure the outcomes were utilized and sustained CONCORDIA improved upon work accomplished in previous years, engaged more stakeholders, and conducted dissemination activities to reach a wider audience outside of the consortium. Despite the challenges posed by the pandemic, WP2 surpassed its target and completed all milestones and deliverables within specified timeline. Collaborations have also been set up with WP3 dealing with community impact and sustainability. WP3 established groundwork for information sharing of cyber threats. Cross-sector pilots TIP succedded and the architecture of DDoS Clearing House was finalized. Additionally, the establishment of legal data-sharing agreement formed the blueprint for broader agreement needed for effective deployment at EU level. Cyber range platforms and training offerings were created to form a cs ecosystem to foster trainings. The EU's educational portfolio has been assessed to develop the initial methodology for creating CS courses and an associated certification schema. Within WP3, "CONCORDIA Platform for Threat Intelligence”, DDoS Clearing House , "CONCORDIA's Ecosystem: Virtual Lab, Services, and Training", "Establishment of a European Education Ecosystem for CS" and the conclusion of Governance model for European Education Ecosystem were accomplished. WP4 provided an overview of cs threat landscape and an outlook of emerging threats and evolving attacks from various perspectives (technological, legal and economic), while created working groups and established liaisons with relevant stakeholders to develop and implement a cs roadmap for Europe. WP4 produced CONCORDIA service catalog as a main entry point for a stakeholder to engage with CONCORDIA. CONCORDIA Open Door events have attracted the attention of stakeholders from all over Europe. The important subject of Women in CS has shown significant advances with the organization of a dedicated workshop producing “Women in Cyber-a Manifesto for TODAY”. Newsletters were delivered quarterly as planned (668 stakeholders - 281 organizations). WP5's key achievements included 32 incubators/accelerators, dissemination in 60 events/conferences, 40 blog posts, 35 infographics, 43 videos, 304 Twitter/290 FB /301 LinkedIn posts, 17 800 of total engagements across SNs, 24 announcements on CONCORDIA website, 9 communication campaigns and 2 successful modules of Horizon Results Booster service ; identification of connection between CONCORDIA tasks and existing standards by identifying 36 Standards Developing Organizations.
WP6 with heavy and stressful tasks due to a large number of partners provided careful governance processes led to achievements like (i) Fast growth, (ii) Knowledge transfer, (iii) Building the CS Community, and (iv) Women in Cyber. WP6 also produced (and regularly updates) the Data Management Plan and also analyzed the existing best practices in innovation management which will be organized in several iterations placed in a concentric spiral model. The respective Data Management Plan was updated with the information from new partners. Overall, the project ended towards its end well, all milestones were been met by March 2023, and alls KPIs were reached.

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

State-of-the-art advances and innovations include: WP1 brought together partners from academia and industry to stimulate collaboration and increase the impact of European research. From publications CONCORDIA researchers and their work focused on venues where security is applied within a specific context, which is a strong indicator that CONCORDIA research is inspired by, and wants to have impact on, real-world security problems. Also researchers in 2022 contributed to the “societal impact” of their work. WP2 worked on the establishment of customized TIP for sector-specific pilots. E-health pilot focused on privacy and data protection in health sector, while other pilot showcases authentication of unmanned aerial systems, with each of them succeeding in presenting a first prototypical demonstrator and establishing a well-working collaboration with researchers.WP3 utilized WP1’s technology developments and WP2’s industry pilots. Through TIP and DDoS Clearing House, WP3 set the basis to reinforce Europe’s CS leadership. WP3 developed a EU-wide CS educational ecosystem and supported them by an appropriate certification schema.
WP4 contributed : a)like a “one-stop-shop” threat landscape suitable for awareness and information exchange initiatives, with innovation advancement also viewed from legal perspective and economic perspective; b) detailed catalog of CONCORDIA services.
WP5 focused on exploitation and certification complemented other WPs to maximize their impact. Further advanced value of results from incubators and accelerators identified and information collected. On certification front, 36 standards-developing organizations were identified and we advanced by providing our own certification schema.WP6 created an advanced Data Management Plan based on information provided by CONCORDIA partners. Innovation-related task developed a unique innovation strategy for CONCORDIA by deeply understanding the Specific challenges of the CS market, the diversity of the stakeholders,  the cultural differences, the dynamics of relationships.

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