Cybersecurity Policy and Resilience

Cybersecurity policy has become an integral part of national and international politics. Amongst other elements, cybersecurity policy includes establishing institutions, the allocation and distribution of resources, processes and legal frameworks, as well as the influence that national policies have on international relations (“spillover effects”). Even if many of these challenges have to be addressed primarily at the national level, it is crucial to learn from each other internationally in order to develop common solutions and to disseminate these solutions.

The programme "Cybersecurity Policy and Resilience" consists of four areas:

●      German Cybersecurity Policy

●      Transatlantic Cyber Forum

●      European Cybersecurity Policy

●      Cyberdiplomacy and Cyber Foreign Policy

The programme is currently supported by the German Federal Foreign Office, the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, and the German Foundation for Peace Research.

The team is regularly interviewed by German- (amongst others Tagesthemen), American- (for example the Washington Post and New York Times) and European media (amongst others EURACTIV) and presents its work at national and international events. It was previously invited to hold presentations at the G7-Ministers-Meeting, the German Bundestag, the Cybersecurity Caucus of the American Congress and the European Parliament.

German Cybersecurity Policy

In terms of German cybersecurity policy, Interface pursues the goal of supporting politicians in pursuing empirically based, better policies. For this purpose, it provides various types of analyses and handouts, such as a mapping of German cybersecurity actors and policy analyses. Furthermore, Interface contributes to the enhancement of expertise in various target groups, including government employees, students and journalists and the exchange of knowledge between experts of the cybersecurity policy community. In addition, Interface takes an active role in public debates in order to set thematic priorities and to introduce new ideas to the media discourse.

Transatlantic Cybersecurity Policy

In January 2017, Interface founded the "Transatlantic Cyber ​​Forum" (TCF). The TCF is an intersectoral, transatlantic cybersecurity expert network with 150 members from civil society, academia, industry, and governments. The TCF constitutes working groups on current issues of transatlantic cybersecurity policy, which aim to develop concrete policy recommendations within a time frame of eleven months.

Please find more information on current working groups and the TCF here.

European Cybersecurity Policy

Interface covers, among other issues, EU cyber diplomacy, the EU cyber security architecture and current topic-specific legislation in the field of IT security. Interface maps relevant EU legislation, policies and actors in the field of EU cybersecurity policy and analyzes how their effective implementation and application can be facilitated. From 2018-2021, Interface implemented the EU-funded project EU Cyber ​​Direct together with the European Institute for Security Studies (EUISS) and the German Marshall Fund (GMF). Interface has been represented on the Advisory Board of the successor project since 2021. Interface is also part of the ENISA Ad-Hoc working group on cybersecurity and artificial intelligence and also sits on the Advisory Committee of the SPARTA project.

Cyber Diplomacy and Cyber Foreign Policy

With societies increasingly digitizing, cybersecurity becomes a focal point of their foreign and security policy. Since the challenges and threats in this field are global and constantly growing, international dialogue is more important than ever – between states but also with companies, academia, and civil society. Such dialogue is essential for establishing effective cooperation that meaningfully complements domestic cybersecurity policies. Interface's Cybersecurity Policy and Resilience Team analyzes debates in current cyber diplomacy fora and formulates recommendations on how these often abstract discourses can be translated into concrete policies. We also explore how states shape international ideas about the appropriateness of certain behaviors through their actions.

Please find more information on this section here.

The team is always available for national and international media inquiries  as well as lectures and presentations.

We generally reject invitations to "manels" (all-male panels). Travel and accommodation costs for events to which our team is invited are generally not covered by Interface; we recommend CO2 compensation for flights and do not take domestic flights. While we generally refrain from speaking fees for presentations within the fields of politics, academia and civil society, we require a remuneration or donation to the SNV for invitations from the private sector.