INCIBE-CERT improves its incident response capabilities through the action of a European project

INCIBE Security Incident Response Center, INCIBE-CERT, will improve its incident response and intelligence capabilities through the action of the European project CERT-C3IS, which has been carried out since June 2018 and will end this October.

Since the beginning of the project, INCIBE has strengthened the INCIBE-CERT services related to prevention, mitigation and incident response. These services complement their capabilities, including reverse engineering techniques, evidence generation and gathering, and management of cyber security threat countermeasures. Furthermore, the intelligence services’ capabilities have been improved, Big Data technology-based services and assessing threats from various public and private sources have been strengthened. These services generate value-added information to develop cybersecurity conclusions and trends. Knowledge that leads to improved early alert, proactive detection and incident reporting services.

The project also envisages the deployment of common tools (project currently led by ENISA called MeliCERTes) at INCIBE to establish a trusted network between European CSIRTs for information-sharing. The main objective of this project is to develop capabilities and build confidence among Member States in order to promote operational and rapid cooperation, as reflected in the NIS Directive. At the technical level this collaboration is supported by a common tool platform among the response centers that are part of the European CSIRT-Network.

About CERT-C3IS

In February 2018, the "Strengthening the capacities of CERTSI (now INCIBE-CERT) to improve cooperation and exchange of intelligence in the European Union" project proposal was selected, along with 10 others, for a grant of 1 million euros (project budget 1.3 million euros). In June 2018, INCIBE began the project, and the initial objective set has now been reached.

The grant comes from the European Funding Programme Connecting Europe Facility (CEF), a key EU funding instrument to promote growth, employment and competitiveness through targeted infrastructure investments throughout Europe.

The specific cybersecurity call (belonging to the CEF-TELECOM-2017 work programme) to which the proposal has been submitted is 2017 CEF Telecom Call - Cyber Security (CEF-TC-2017-2), which seeks to develop the capabilities of national CERTs designated by Member States under the Directive on the security of networks and information systems (Directive (EU) 2016/1148) known as the "NIS Directive". Regarding the CEF-TELECOM sub-programme, Spain has received more than 12 million euros, thanks to 32 projects funded since 2014, and is at first place out of the participating countries (provisional results).