Cybersecurity
Abstract
This chapter analyses in what ways and to what extent cybersecurity, and the European Union’s (EU) perception of and responses to this threat, challenges the existing geographic, bureaucratic, and functional security divides within the EU. Cyber-security strives to preserve the availability and integrity of the networks and infrastructure and the confidentiality of the information contained therein. The common thread running through the multiple strands of cybersecurity is the environment within which the threats occur: cyberspace. Central to the EU’s approach to tackling cybercrime has been support for, and promotion of, the 2001 Council of Europe Convention on Cybercrime, which came into force in 2004. Within the EU, cyberdefence is not about developing offensive cyber capabilities, as it is for a small number of member states. The promotion and protection of EU values and norms is a central pillar of EU cyber-diplomacy, as it seeks to mould cyberspace governance and relations.