Information Security Awareness, Literacy and Privacy

The establishment of an expert network was a cornerstone achievement, bringing together professionals from across the EU to collaboratively address information security issues relevant to citizens...

The establishment of an expert network was a cornerstone achievement, bringing together professionals from across the EU to collaboratively address information security issues relevant to citizens' daily lives. The expert knowledge brought together in two workshops and a Lead User Workshop and was used for developing practical tools for SME with focus on European regions and international supply chains. In addition, business cooperations between the partner networks could be established and the project contextualized discussions around digital citizenship and identity, expanding beyond economic sustainability. Information security competencies were framed as contributing to resilient citizenship. Building on the prior projects ISALIP continued discussions on effective information security education practices in AE VET and HE and developed practical tools for private environment. The project facilitated EU level collaboration by connecting practitioners and decision-makers from diverse fields, promoting meaningful knowledge exchange. The project consortium demonstrated forward-thinking by working out different possible project ideas for a larger application in the field of information security.

The ISALIP project took an iterative approach. In Activity 1, a Monitoring of Regional Actors and Regulations was carried out. With analyzing and easy-to-understand consolidation of information security frameworks, regulations and actors in the project partner countries and the EU an information basis for SME and citizen-relevant issues was created with the focus on information needed for doing business in European-regions (more precisely, the Baltic States, Germany, Poland and the Czech Republic). The results were discussed in a Lead User Workshop (Activity 2) with lead users from various disciplines from Germany, Lithuania and the EU to identify best practices. The developed ISALIP seeding materials were then piloted and evaluated with the addressed target groups via a Company Engagement (Activity 3). A survey of SMEs as well as an intensive pilot at a sole proprietorship and a final workshop with experts from various fields were carried out. The feedback was integrated into the ISALIP seeding materials and in order to achieve impactful results, the project team made sure that the target groups were informed about the project, aware of the Activities and interested in using them (Activity 4 Dissemination).

The main outcome of ISALIP are practical tools for SME – the ISALIP Seeding Materials – in the context of Information/ Cyber Security. The planned Monitoring was extended to an "SME Guide to Cyber Security”. The key requirements for SMEs and the requirements at EU level, particularly in relation to international supply chains, were defined, opportunities highlighted and a guidance for SMEs developed. This also included a consideration of EU regulations and the cyber security architecture as well as the upcoming EU harmonization projects CRA and NIS2 Directive. The complexity of entering the German market was analyzed and an additional output was developed by translating the matching of ISO27001 and IT-Grundschutz (BSI) into Lithuanian. Further materials were created as video interviews in German on YouTube. Building on the prior projects the ISALIP continued discussions on effective information security education practice and developed a curriculum for Cyber Security in SME. Based on the company engagement the “Rules for turning work-based learning material into private-sector engagement” and a booklet for a “Cyber Security Awareness Guide for Citizen - Protect yourself online“ were developed.