Cyber Diplomacy in a Geopolitically Changing World

Christina Rupp participated in the workshop “Cyber Diplomacy in a Geopolitically Changing World,” organized by The Hague Program on International Cybersecurity, which brought together cyber diplomats from EU Member States and researchers. In a session on “Navigating the Changing Geopolitical Landscape: Possible European Strategic Objectives,” she highlighted two key objectives for the EU in input remarks. First, Christina called for a more systematic connection between the EU’s regulatory footprint and its external action that bridges what Europe does regionally with what it promotes internationally, for example, in operationalizing the UN framework for responsible state behaviour at the UN level. Second, while ambition for EU-level collaboration on cybersecurity matters is growing, particularly in areas relating to situational awareness and incident response, divergences remain regarding the direction and depth such EU-level collaboration should take. In this regard, Christina emphasized the need to discuss concrete options for managing the de facto securitization of EU cybersecurity policy by exploring what it would take to balance the push for deeper EU-level operational cooperation with Member States’ national security prerogatives and what trade-offs would be involved.