NATO has agreed to open a new cyber defense facility in Europe that will defend its members from advanced digital threats.
Revealed during the organization’s latest summit in Washington, DC, the future Integrated Cyber Defence Center (NICC) is expected to bolster the alliance’s network dependability, situational awareness, and associated missions “throughout peacetime, crisis, and conflict.”
The NICC will cover broader tasks, such as preserving data sharing between military commanders on vulnerabilities in the alliance’s cyberspace.
Alongside tactical support, the center will implement protection for critical cyber infrastructures managed by civilian groups that benefit the members’ national defense capabilities.
NATO confirmed that the NICC will be based at the Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe (SHAPE) in Mons, Belgium.
Additional details on the project will be disclosed in the coming months, the organization wrote in a press release.
“The Centre will bring together civilian and military personnel from across the NATO Enterprise, Allied countries and experts from industry,” NATO said.
“It will leverage advanced technologies to increase our situational awareness in cyberspace and enhance collective resilience and defence.”
Countering Authoritarian Threats
NATO’s latest cyber strategy followed the alliance’s plan last year to improve its members’ collective resilience against “authoritarian regimes.”
This move came after the continuous infiltration of the organization’s cyber domain in recent years, which is often linked to actors backed by China and Russia.
Among these attacks was one recorded in October 2023 that resulted in missing NATO documents.
Latest Cyber Projects
In response to modern cyber threats, the organization has laid out several projects that could further expand its dominance in the digital landscape.
NATO collaborated with a US academic institute in June to assemble lessons for allied cyber defense training in Europe.
In May 2023, NATO accepted Ukraine as part of its existing Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence, which oversees information networks of allied countries across the US, Japan, and Europe from its base in Estonia.
The organization signed contracts four months earlier with tech giant IBM to cover the integration, sustainment, and configuration services for its cyber defense assets.
After the ease of the pandemic, NATO facilitated a simulation to prepare its digital specialists against “information warfare” and cyber attacks on critical infrastructure such as mobile networks, financial sectors, and water supplies.