Montenegro to Join NATO Cyber-Defence Centre

Montenegro is to join the NATO cyber defence centre based in Estonia by 2019, to tighten up its cyber protection abilities after coming under a series of attacks in 2016 and 2017.

The government has approved the accession of the Ministry of Defence and the signing the two memoranda on the establishment of operations and functional relationships with NATO's Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence, based in Tallinn.

The accession documents will be signed this summer, and Montenegro is expected to join the cyber defence group in 2019. Montenegro will have a status of a "sponsoring nation".

Involvement in the cyber defence centre will enable Montenegro to build up and develop its national capabilities in cyber security, amid reports that Russian hackers attacked several government agencies and media online publications.

In the accession documents, obtained by BIRN, the government said that now the country had joined NATO, in June 2017, "attacks on the cyber-space of Montenegro could more complex and have greater consequences.

"In recent years, especially just before it became a member of NATO, Montenegro was the target of a number of cyber-attacks, which is why it had to develop its own capacities in cyber defence," the government said.

The 18-member centre's mission is to improve the capacity, cooperation and information sharing among NATO member nations and partners in cyber-defence, through education, research and development, analyses and consultations.

The NATO centre also hosts a yearly exercise, Locked Shields, which allows member nations to practice fending off cyber-threats in real-time.

Recently, Romania also said it would join the centre in Tallinn by 2019. Bulgaria, Norway, Portugal, Australia and...