NATO’s nations voted unanimously to accept Ukraine as a contributing participant to the organization’s Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence (CCDCOE), which will allow the country to participate in its ongoing work.

The Estonia-based CCDCOE is a NATO-accredited cyber knowledge hub, research institution, and training and exercise facility, which focuses on interdisciplinary applied research, as well as consultations, training and exercises in the field of cyber security.

“Ukraine’s presence in the Centre will enhance the exchange of cyber expertise, between Ukraine and CCDCOE member nations. Ukraine could bring valuable first-hand knowledge of several adversaries within the cyber domain to be used for research, exercises and training,” Col Jaak Tarien, Director of the NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence said.

“Capability and knowledge comes from experience, and Ukraine definitely has valuable experience from previous cyber-attacks to provide significant value to the NATO CCDCOE,” Minister of Defence of Estonia Kalle Laanet commented.

Over the past several weeks, Ukraine was hit by multiple cyberattacks ranging from DDoS attacks against its government websites to data wiper attacks targeting Ukrainian computer networks. Some of these attacks were launched just before Russia invaded Ukraine.

Cybersecurity Help’s statement on the critical situation in Ukraine

On February 24, people in many cities and towns across Ukraine woke up to the sounds of explosions and artillery fire, as the Russian Federation launched a full-scale invasion of the country. Such actions are unacceptable, political ambitions of any man aren’t worth of blood, tears, and destruction of millions of lives. We give our full support to the Ukrainian people in these hard times. No more war!