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Cyber defence and priorities on the agenda of the
The emergence in the last decades of new security risks - mainly stemming from the accelerated technological evolution - as well as the need to ensure capabilities in the military satellite communications area, have forced Ministry of National Defence (MApN) to rethink its priorities and to take certain decisions. Thus, with effect from December 1, 2018, a
Cyber Defence Command was established within
the Romanian Army. It is subordinated to the Chief of General Staff of the Defence and commanded by Brigadier General Costică Postolache.
The new Army unit will have to respond to the specific challenges that cyber attacks pose to national security, with an increasing number
of countries investing in such capabilities worldwide.
The MApN decision on the establishment of the Cyber Defence Command is even more relevant if we take into account the hybrid forms of aggression used in our region in the recent period, characterised by NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg as “a mix
of military and non-military aggression measures, a combination of open and hidden operations”.
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Romania, part of NATO’s effort to counter cyber threats
In this context, it is also worth mentioning that Romania contributed with a team of more than 70 people to the cyber defence exercise called ‘Cyber Coalition 2018’, the most important of its kind organised by NATO.
The main objective of the ‘Cyber Coalition 2018’
was to provide training and to test the Alliance’s ability to defend its computer networks against third-party challenges when operating in a field susceptible to cyber confrontations.
The coordination centre of the exercise was in Tartu, Estonia, it was planned by the Allied Command for Transformation and headed by the NATO Military Committee.
“It is a distributed-type exercise and each nation participates on its national territory by securely connecting to the cyber network provided by
the Estonian Ministry of Defence and configured for this exercise by the CyberInt Centre of the Romanian Intelligence Service”, MApN explained.
“The purpose of the exercise
is to practice procedures and quick coordination measures between national and Alliance experts that use their skills to manage a series of scenarios that have become increasingly complex in the recent years.” Using a virtually controlled environment, all participants have to deal with scenarios involving complex threats and they must provide solutions”, the quoted source said.
Romania, a potential provider of satellite services at NATO’s southeast border
As part of the significant ongoing efforts of the Ministry of Defence to equip