EU to bolster cybersecurity through cross-border cooperation

The EU will review its cybersecurity strategy this autumn, following widespread ransomware attacks, the Commission has announced.

Cyberattacks on critical infrastructure such as power grids, chemical plants, transport systems and financial networks, are becoming ever more common, said Andrus Ansip, vice-president for the digital single market, at a conference at Chatham House on 26 June. Europe must put EU-wide safety certification in place, he said.

The Commission endorsed an update of its cybersecurity strategy last week, following the Wannacry ransom attack in May 2017, which targeted UK hospitals, Spain’s Telefónica, parcel delivery company FedEx and Deutsche Bahn, Germany’s rail service provider. Ansip commented that this prompted the first-ever instance of an EU-wide cybersecurity operation. But, he said, the attacks also revealed the “worrying gaps and shortcomings” of the continent’s cyber-defence.