The GFCE's Activities
The GFCE strengthens international cooperation on cyber capacity building (CCB) by connecting needs, resources, and expertise and by making practical knowledge available to the global community. To do this, it uses several GFCE mechanisms in its work plan, such as:
- the Working Groups,
- the Cybil Knowledge Portal,
- the Global Cyber Capacity Building Research Agenda,
- the Clearing House mechanism.
GFCE Members and Partners collaborate with each other through the GFCE mechanisms and engage with the broader cyberspace communities.
The Working Groups aim to strengthen international cooperation and coordination on their respective theme by developing a common focus, enabling efficient use of available resources, and avoiding duplication of efforts. The Working Groups focus on identifying who’s doing what (coordination), what useful tools are already out there (knowledge sharing), and how the Working Group can help a member with a request for support (clearing house).
The Working Group can be seen as the foundation for the other identified themes in the Delhi Communiqué. The work of the group is divided across two Task Forces: Strategy and Assessments; and CBMs, Norms Implementation & Cyber Diplomacy.
The Working Group is divided into two Task Forces. The first Task Force focusses on the worldwide capacity building of Cyber Incident Management (CIM), the second Task Force on identifying and protecting (national) Critical Infrastructure Protection (CIP) sectors.
The Working Group brings together organizations and experts focused on coordination of policy and efforts relating to legal frameworks, law enforcement, investigation, prevention and training in the field of cybercrime.
The Working Group focusses on the following topics: Cyber Security Awareness and Cyber Security Education and Training, specifically related to Cyber Security Workforce Development.
Cybil – the CCB knowledge portal
The globally owned one-stop knowledge hub brings together knowledge on international cyber capacity building. It is a unique source of information on tools, publications, overview of activities on cyber capacity building globally, upcoming events, and the GFCE Working Group outcomes. To underline the global character of Cybil, the Working Groups are responsible for approving the tools and publications that are uploaded on Cybil through a silent procedure. While most of the content on Cybil is currently gathered through the GFCE community, the Cybil portal group – ASPI, DiploFoundation, FIRST, GCSCC and NUPI – are amongst others actively promoting Cybil in their networks to gather ideas and input from the global cyber capacity building community.
Recognizing that cyber capacity building can never be a one-size-fits-all model and that tailored assistance to local contexts is a determinant of successful capacity building projects, the GFCE seeks to be a capacity building clearing house. Through the GFCE Working Groups, the GFCE plays a ‘match-making’ role; effectively matching country, private sector and civil society donors and implementers that can provide key capacity building services with countries that request assistance. Through this process, the GFCE is currently helping Sierra Leone with their National Cyber Security Strategy, Senegal with setting up a CSIRT (Computer Security Incident Response Team) and their national CIIP framework, and The Gambia with Cybercrime Legislation.
CCB research agenda
In discussing the challenges faced by the GFCE community, it became increasingly clear that knowledge gaps existed and the GFCE could potentially address these gaps. To help the capacity building community design and run effective projects, a new pillar of the GFCE Working Groups was thus introduced in 2020. Through the Working Groups, knowledge gaps and research that would be useful and that may help the community achieve their strategic and operational goals are being identified. The GFCE is collecting and prioritizing these research needs into a Global Cyber Capacity Building Research Agenda. This also responds to the call of the GFCE Community for a flexible mechanism that would help them identify common research requirements and generate targeted research relevant to ongoing GFCE work and Member’s activities. The Global Cyber Capacity Building Research Agenda 2022 is available for download here.
Initiatives
GFCE members and partners can collaborate by putting forward initiatives focusing on global cyber capacity building. The purpose of the GFCE initiatives is to address cyber capacity building challenges by bringing together resources such as knowledge and expertise.
Initiatives are started by at least two GFCE members and are established within the parameters of the GFCE principles. The GFCE functions as a platform to connect demand and supply in cyber capacity building, facilitates the purposes of an initiative, and shares the products of the initiative publicly with the GFCE network.
Global Cyber Expertise Magazine
Bi-annual online magazine about on global cyber policy developments and capacity building projects. The Global Cyber Expertise Magazine is jointly published by the African Union, the European Union, the Global Forum on Cyber Expertise and the Organization of American States.
