THE European Union will be provided with a “cyber shield” to better protect against cyber attacks, the 27 member countries announced today.

The EU will be provided with one alarm systemwhich will span its entire territory, to better detect potential cyberattacks, which have multiplied since the Russian invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022.

The detection of these attacks will be assigned to a European network six or seven “cybernodes,” according to the announcement.

Equipped with supercomputers and with artificial intelligence systemswill operate based on the model of the Galileo satellite system, the European Commission had stated when presenting, last year, the program for this “cyber shield”.

The idea is to reduce as much as possible o detection time of an IT attack on European infrastructure (hospitals, energy networks, etc.) so that it can be better countered.

Today, an average of 190 days pass from the beginning of the spread of a malicious software (malware) until the moment it is detected, the Commission underlined last April.

The EU will also be provided with a “cyber reserve“, consisting of thousands of public and private service providers, on a voluntary basis, to support the defense effort in the event of an attack. A member state, an institution and some associated third countries, such as Switzerland or Sweden, will be able to call on this “reserve” in the event of a significant or large-scale attack, according to the 27 announcement.

The cost of this “cyber shield” was calculated last April by the Commission at more than 1 billion eurostwo-thirds of which will be funded by the EU.

These new measures are to be formally adopted by the EU Council and the European Parliament.