Cybersecurity Skills Academy: Join the discussion and find project partners!

Objective: The global shortage of cybersecurity professionals, with around 200,000 experts missing in Europe, is a critical challenge due to legislative initiatives like the NIS2 Directive and Cyber Resilience Act. Despite previous actions, there's a need to prevent scattered efforts. The Cybersecurity Skills Academy initiative, led by the European Commission, the European Cybersecurity Competence Centre (ECCC), and the European Union Agency for Cybersecurity (ENISA), aims to address this by integrating learning activities under a European framework for increased impact and accessibility.

Scope: Proposals must focus on either Activity 1 or 2:

1) Training programmes for SMEs, start-ups and the public sector for the Cybersecurity Skills Academy:

• Implement new or scale up existingtraining opportunities with a focus on SMEs, start-ups, and public administrations in cybersecurity.
• Tailor training to business needs, emphasizing upskilling, reskilling, and interdisciplinary understanding for civil servants.
• Consortia should involve cybersecurity organizations, universities, or training providers and devise relevant activities, including identifying courses, bootcamps, and communication actions.
• Online training courses are recommended, and collaboration with national Cybersecurity Competence Centres (NCCs) is expected.

2) The Cybersecurity Skills Academy:

• Support operations and governance of the Academy, measuring impact and bringing together stakeholders from all Member States.
• Coordinate with the European Cybersecurity Competence Centre (ECCC), National Cybersecurity Competences (NCCs), and European Union Agency for Cybersecurity (ENISA).
• Explore a scheme for cybersecurity competence recognition and certification, using ENISA's European Cybersecurity Skills Framework (ECSF).
• Promote the development of up-to-date curricula, perform communication, and leverage tools like the Digital Skills and Jobs Platform and ENISA’s CyberHEAD database.

It is intended that only one proposal will be funded under Activity 2. The typical size of a project under this Activity should be up to €2.000.000 of the EU grant amount. In addition, collaboration with the selected Coordination and Support Action (CSA) is required for both activities. The CSA will provide support and collaboration activities for projects under this topic.

Funding: € 10.000.000
Deadline: The application deadline is 21 March 2024 17:00, Brussels time.
Call Text: The call for proposal text can be viewed here.  
Call Information: Available on the Funding & Tender Portal.
Info session: On 12 December 2023, the European Commission will present the fifth round of the DIGITAL Europe Programme call for proposals in a dedicated Info Day and Pitching Event.

Find Project Partners & Prepare Proposals  

Do you want to find consortia partners and participate in this call?  

Simply use the Comments feature at the bottom of this tread to introduce your organisation, express your interest in creating or joining a consortia, indicate your desired role in the project, and provide a link to your Member Profile on the platform or your personal email address. You can see some organisations have already added their profiles below, so feel free to follow their lead! 

You can also message Community Members directly using the new Private Messages feature, just click the Messages button on the top right of the screen when you are logged in as shown in the screen grab below. This is an excellent way to contact potential partners in a secure and discrete manner. 

If you want to receive email notifications with the latest comments and posts by potential partners just click the Subscribe button beside the title of this thread: 

If you have questions or comments our Community Team are ready and waiting to help.  

Best of luck with your proposals!