RCC CyberPulse 2025: Regional Stakeholder Join Forces in Cybersecurity

02.07.2025

The High-Level Western Balkans Cybersecurity Conference – CyberPulse 2025: Tracking Progress, Building Resilience, Driving Change – gathered government representatives, EU institutions, regional organizations, cybersecurity experts and private sector leaders to address the growing cyber threat landscape in the Western Balkans.

CyberPulse 2025 focused on three priorities:

addressing current gaps in regional cyber capacities,
exploring the role of emerging technologies, and
operationalising joint initiatives and partnerships.

Opening Remarks

The conference opened with high-level messages of commitment to regional cyber resilience:

Amer Kapetanović, Secretary General of the RCC, highlighted the sharp rise in cyber incidents and stressed that trust, political will and coordinated regional action are the strongest “firewall” against threats. He also announced the development of the new regional cybersecurity needs database.
Filip Ivanović, Deputy Prime Minister of Montenegro for Foreign and European Affairs, emphasized Montenegro’s adoption of European cybersecurity standards and its vision of a secure, resilient digital future as part of EU integration.
Michael Docherty, speaking on behalf of the European Commission Delegation, reaffirmed EU support for the region through initiatives with ENISA and the Council of Europe, underlining that cybersecurity is now a central element of the EU Growth Plan for the Western Balkans.
Gilles Schwoerer, Head of WB3C, noted that while digital transformation offers many opportunities, it also expands the attack surface, underscoring the urgent need for secure digital pathways and collective resilience.

Conference Panels

High-Level Panel: Stronger Connectivity, Smarter Security, Resilient Future (moderated by Danijela Gačević, Head of the Programme Department, RCC)
Senior government representatives from the region exchanged views on national priorities, institutional capacities, and EU integration in the field of cybersecurity.
- Governments stressed the shortage of cybersecurity professionals as a critical challenge.
- Kosovo*’s representative emphasized dependence on external consultants and the need to train public servants internally.
- Montenegro focused on intersectoral cooperation and the role of NATO and EU support.
- North Macedonia presented its new Ministry for Digital Transformation and its national cybersecurity strategy.
  Panelists:
- Bardhyl Dobra – Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs, Pristina
- Naim Gjokaj – State Secretary, Ministry of Public Administration, Podgorica
- Radoslav Nastasijevikj Vardjiski – Deputy Minister for Digital Transformation, Skopje
Navigating Cyber Threats in the Western Balkans: The Evolving Role of AI and Emerging Technologies (moderated by Mirza Jamaković, Prosecutor's Office Sarajevo)
Experts from Europol, law enforcement, and the private sector discussed the opportunities and risks of AI, from forensic tools to the misuse of generative AI by organized crime groups.
- Europol described using machine learning to analyze millions of data points in criminal investigations.
- Concerns raised about organized crime groups developing their own AI tools, including large language models, for cybercrime.
- Calls for explainable and transparent AI outcomes in cybersecurity decision-making.
- Oracle warned against uploading confidential data into public AI tools, stressing regulatory gaps.
  Panelists:
- Emmanuel Kessler – Europol
- Jelena Zelenović Matone – WomenCyberForce / Women4Cyber
- Nenad Bogunović – Cybercrime Unit, Belgrade
- Amar Dedović – Oracle
Empowering Talent: Skill-Building for the Future in the Western Balkans (moderated by Andreja Mihailović, Women4Cyber Montenegro)
The session focused on education, workforce shortages, women’s participation in cybersecurity, and ways to redirect youth talent from informal digital activities to formal opportunities.
- Highlighted that women’s participation in cybersecurity remains below 20% in the Western Balkans.
- Croatia shared progress from 30% to 52% female participation in the UN Cybersecurity Working Group between 2019 and 2024.
- Albania’s Cybersecurity Agency argued for education reform starting at primary school.
- Open Society Foundation raised concerns about youth involvement in grey/illegal digital activities, calling for redirection into formal sectors.
  Panelists:
- Tamara Tafra – Deputy Minister of Foreign and European Affairs, Zagreb
- Igli Tafa – Director, National Cybersecurity Agency, Tirana
- Andi Dobrushi – Open Society Foundation
- Fabio di Franco – ENISA
Integrating Experience and Strategy: A Multisector Dialogue on SOC Advancement (moderated by Vanja Madžgalj, WB3C)
Panelists shared good practices for building and operating Security Operations Centres, stressing the importance of policy alignment, inter-sectoral cooperation and trust-building between public and private actors.
Albania’s national experience showed that the 2022 cyberattack became a catalyst for building SOC capacity and adopting “zero trust” and defense-in-depth strategies.
Differences between public and private sector approaches to threat intelligence were emphasized, with trust and data-sharing seen as barriers for public institutions.
North Macedonia introduced a new law placing the Ministry for Digital Transformation as the central cybersecurity authority.
Panelists:
- Franc Zyliftari – Head of Incident Response Team, Tirana
- Philippe Gillet – Gatewatcher, Paris
- Aleksandar Acev – Cyber Balkans, Skopje
Sectors United Against Cyber Threats: Building Bridges Across Sectors (Milan Sekuloski, e-Governance Academy, Tallinn)
This discussion brought together public institutions, civil society, academia, and the private sector, highlighting how multi-stakeholder collaboration is essential to strengthening regional resilience.
- Pristina shared good practices in bringing all relevant actors together regularly on critical infrastructure protection.
- Civil society organizations were recognized as important but vulnerable actors requiring targeted cyber hygiene tools and support.
- SMEs were highlighted as particularly exposed, requiring systemic support from the public sector.
- The EBRD linked its investment strategy to cybersecurity, showing that infrastructure projects cannot be sustainable without integrated cyber risk management.
  Panelists:
- Lulezon Jagxhiu – Prime Minister’s Cabinet, Pristina
- Predrag Puharić – Cybersecurity Centre of Excellence, Sarajevo
- Ivona Dabetić – NGO Secure, Podgorica
- Roy Yarom – European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD)

The conference concluded that cybersecurity in the Western Balkans can no longer be treated as a purely technical issue but must be recognized as a strategic priority, requiring long-term cooperation, sustained investment and coordinated regional action.

Other news and events

Four days of OSINT and Dark Web training for Western Balkan law enforcement

This week at WB3C, police officers and prosecutors from the Western Balkans worked through a four-day practical programme on Open-Source Intelligence (OSINT) and Dark Web investigations, delivered in cooperation with CIVIPOL and EU4FAST.
Led by WB3C training team Cyril CORRIAS and Jean-Pierre Bonnet, the course focused on the practical skills needed to collect and analyse publicly available information in support of Internet investigations — from identifying potential threats and gathering digital evidence to producing actionable intelligence.

The programme moved progressively through the fundamentals of Internet investigations and evidence preservation, protection and anonymisation techniques, social network investigations, online checks and surveys, and safe navigation of the Dark Web, combining each area with practical exercises. Participants also worked on approaches to data collection and the legal and ethical considerations linked to the use of digital information.

The training brought together law-enforcement practitioners from the WB6 who were attending a WB3C programme for the first time, expanding the network of professionals in the region equipped to work with open-source information in increasingly complex digital investigations.

Our thanks to our partners CIVIPOL and EU4FAST, and especially Marie Pierre MOSIN for supporint this programme, and to all participants for four intensive and highly practical days in Podgorica.

Minister Delegate Marie-Pierre Vedrenne Visits WB3C

On the sidelines of the BerlinProcess meetings held in Montenegro this week, we were honoured to welcome Ms Marie-Pierre Vedrenne, Minister Delegate to the Minister of the Interior, responsible for Citizenship.

Accompanied by the newly appointed French Ambassador to Montenegro, Ms Cécile Humbert-Bouvier, the Minister met with the WB3C team and learned more about the training programmes being delivered at the Cyber Centre this week.

She spoke with participants, WB3C trainers and external experts, including Reza Elgalai from the University of Technology of Troyes (UTT) and Major Marc TEROUANNE of the French Gendarmerie, who travelled to the WB3C specifically to deliver digital forensics training.

The Minister also met with Polish experts from NASK, who are working alongside Slovenia’s URSIV to deliver cybersecurity training focused on disinformation. She also engaged with CIVIPOL experts from the EU4FAST project, who are providing specialised cybercrime and OSINT training to strengthen the fight against migrant smuggling and irregular migration.

Cyber awareness, disinformation and OSINT: three connected perspectives on working safely with information

This week at WB3C, participants from public institutions across the Western Balkans are looking at the information environment from three different but closely connected perspectives: cyber awareness, disinformation and open-source intelligence (OSINT).
The training is delivered by Marcin Napiórkowski, Sylwia Adamczyk and Jakub Orzeszek from NASK – the Polish Research and Academic Computer Network, combining practical cyber hygiene with an understanding of how information is manipulated, verified and analysed online.
The first part of the course focuses on cyber awareness in both private and professional environments. Participants examine common threats from an end-user perspective, incident reporting, protection of email and social media accounts, and the security practices that organisations can put in place to reduce everyday exposure.
From there, the discussion moves to disinformation and the mechanisms that make it effective: filter bubbles, cognitive biases and techniques such as false context and cherry-picking. An important part of the work is not only recognising manipulation, but understanding how institutions can respond and communicate when misleading information begins to affect their reputation or the audiences they serve.
The OSINT component then takes participants into the practical work of finding, verifying and evaluating information from open digital sources. Search techniques, social media and visual-media analysis are combined with exercises in identifying disinformation and checking the reliability of what has been found.
There is also another side to OSINT that is sometimes overlooked: protecting the analyst. Participants are introduced to OPSEC methodologies and operational anonymity, looking at how research can be conducted without unnecessarily exposing the analyst, the organisation or the investigative workflow.
Bringing these three areas together is particularly relevant for public institutions. The same digital environment in which staff communicate and work is also the environment in which information is collected, manipulated, amplified and investigated.
By the end of the course, the objective is therefore not simply to know more tools or terminology, but to be better able to recognise threats, question information, verify sources and work more securely online.
Gilles Schwoerer, our Programme Director, greeted the participants and thanked our partners in URSIV, Urad Vlade Republike Slovenije za informacijsko varnost for funding this training and its continued support to WB3C activities.