The Center
The Center for Cyber Security and International Relations Studies (CCSIRS) is part of the Interdepartmental Center for Strategic, International and Entrepreneurial Studies (CSSII) at the Department of Political Sciences of the University of Florence. Established in 2015, the CCSIRS aims at promoting and deepening the knowledge on cyberspace dynamics through a policy-oriented approach.
The center’s research focuses on a wide range of topics related to cybersecurity, including cyber warfare, cyber terrorism, critical infrastructure protection, and the impact of emerging technologies on cybersecurity. The CCSIRS consists of a team of researchers, professors and students who collaborate on research projects, organize seminars and conferences, and provide training and education programs on cybersecurity.
In particular, the activities carried out by the Center are focused on analyzing the influence of cyberspace on Italian national security and, moreover, the stability, peace and security of the global international system. The Center primarily aims to contribute to the promotion and dissemination of the cybersecurity culture, both in the private and public sectors.
The center also collaborates with other institutions and academic organizations around the world to promote knowledge and understanding in the field of cybersecurity. Overall, CCSIR is a leading cybersecurity research center, and the center’s extensive experience in research on the intersection of cybersecurity and international relations makes it particularly relevant research in an era of growing global connectivity and technological progress.
Activities
The Center’s multidisciplinary approach succeeds in integrating the traditional fields of Social Sciences (politics, economics, law, strategic and military studies) and Computer Science. The analyses are conducted by Italian and international experts from various sectors and countries.
The Center shapes its international activities by creating an ever-increasing solid network of public and private partnerships, aiming at guaranteeing excellent research. Through its established collaborations with numerous scholars, researchers, experts, consultants and students, the Center deals with the following topics:
• Cyber Warfare
• Cyber Diplomacy
• Cyber Security
• Cyber Crime
• Cyber Law
• Cyber Intelligence
• Cyber Terrorism
• Digital Economy
In order to promote awareness on cyber security issues, the Center offers:
- Free access to its collection of publications, articles and academic papers.
- A bibliographic section entirely dedicated to cyberspace issues, with over 3000 titles classified by area of interest.
- A free newsletter on national and global cybersecurity developments.
Brief analyses and daily updates are also offered through the Center’s social media: Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter.
Research
The Center’s research focuses on comparative analysis of best cases and best practices in the fields of cyber strategy, governance and policy, critical infrastructures, economic and financial cybercrimes, privacy protection legislations and cyber intelligence structures. Complementarily, it carries out studies on the different approaches adopted internationally by both private and public actors.
The Center offers:
- A reserved database for both qualitative and quantitative cyber policy analyses;
- Detailed Country Profiles aiming at offering both Country Cyber Governance and Risk Maps and Cyber Business Maps.
The profiles include data on national cyber security governance and involved stakeholders.
Projects
Through its consolidated network of partnerships with universities, research centers, international organizations, private actors and public institutions, the Center is involved in the development of both national and international projects. In particular:
-The Center coordinates a project involving American, Canadian, Russian and Israeli universities. The project aims at providing tools to improve policy-making activities in themanagement of cyber crises by focussing on the classification and attribution of cyber attacks and incidents.
- In 2023 the Center has been recognized with the status of Observer in the Open-ended working group on reducing space threats through norms, rules and principles of responsible behaviours based on the General Assembly resolution 76/231.
- Through an agreement with the Italian Ministry for International Affairs and International Cooperation (MAECI), the Center is an active part of the permanent table of the G7 IseShima Cyber Group. In 2017 the Center contributed to the drafting of the Lucca Declaration "Declaration on Norms for Responsible State Behavior in Cyberspace”.
-Since 2016, the Center has been the Implementing Partner of the “Enhancing the implementation of OSCE CBMs to reduce the risk of conflict stemming from the use of ICTs” project, in collaboration with the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE). Through comparative analysis and the study of the 57 OSCE country members’ cyber profiles, the project aims to identify the obstacles that countries face in applying Confidence Building Measures (CBMs) in cyberspace. Furthermore, in order to improve the implementation of CBMs, the Center has developed an Action Plan to develop Cyber Capacity Building by Design (CCBD) programs.
- In 2015, the Center began “ICT and Cyber Security: the role of the CERT (Computer Emergency Report Team) in managing emerging global cyber threats – a comparison of international experiences”, a project financed by the Italian National CERT and Istituto Superiore delle Comunicazioni e delle Tecnologie Dell'informazione (ISCOM).
Head of the CCSIRS is Luigi Martino
last update: 03-Sep-2023