WB3C Joins IT Spot 2025 Tech Summit in Podgorica

30.10.2025

IT SPOT 2025 opened yesterday, 30 October, and continues today in Podgorica. Montenegro’s leading tech summit gathered global voices in innovation, AI and cybersecurity at the Montenegrin Music Centre.

Our Program Director and Head of WB3C, Gilles Schwoerer, joined a panel moderated by Branko Džakula of UN1QUELY to examine capacity building in the Western Balkans. Two questions framed the discussion:

how to grow talent sustainably over the long term and
how to reduce brain drain.

Gilles outlined WB3C’s institutional capacity-building across cybersecurity, cybercrime and cyber diplomacy as short-term gap fillers. However, for durable results, he emphasized the need to co-develop curricula with universities and the private sector and enable a continuous talent growth. To illustrate this, he described WB3C's two diploma programs that we deliver jointly with universities: one on digital forensics, and a new course on cybersecurity launching next month. The approach WB3C is taking is to find ways of embedding these modules in university programs to enhance academic offer for long term development.

On brain drain, Gilles stressed that maintaining strong links with your cyber alumni at home and abroad is key for creating a reserve pool of experts and described France’s cyber reserve model as a template for national surge capacity and civic commitment. He explained that the reserve model fosters a sense of patriotism and obligation to help your country in need.

Andreja Mihailović, President of Women for Cyber Montenegro and Manager of the Cybersecurity Innovation Hub at the University of Montenegro reinforced the idea that cybersecurity is mission-driven work and not just a career path. She said that cybersecurity does not only protect our technology and our infrastructure but it protects people: it protects hospitals from ransomware, schools from cyberbullying, and our elections from manipulation. Skills matter, and so do values. Purpose, recognition and a sense of service are things that keep talent engaged.

Another important point made at the panel is that we should speak about brain circulation rather than brain drain, as it is important for young people to be able to gain international experience so they can come back to share this knowledge at home.

Thank you to ICT Cortex for an excellent event and for enabling us to reconnect with partners and friends, hear insightfl presentations and meet new people that are interested in joining forces with us for a stronger Western Balkans.

Other news and events

Second Cybersecurity Diploma Prep Course Completed

Our second Prep Course cohort (December) led by Ljuban Petrovic just finished two intense weeks of learning, practice and assessment. These ICT students showed up with curiosity and ambition to build their future career in cybersecurity field.

Now, the bigger picture:

We’ve completed two Prep Course cohorts (November + December), with 18 students in total from the Western Balkans. They have already taken the final test, and the final selection will be made in January for the free Cybersecurity University Diploma starting in February 2026, delivered by WB3C in cooperation with the Université de Technologie de Troyes (UTT).

What makes this course unique is that it’s not “just another training.” It’s a real academic pathway that helps students build lasting qualifications and it sits alongside our year round short courses as part of a wider talent strategy.

What this diploma prepares students for (entry roles):
🛡️ Security Administrator
🧠 SOC Analyst (Junior)
🧪 Junior Penetration Tester
🔍 Digital Forensics Technician
✅ Cybersecurity Auditor (Junior)

What happens next:

📝 January: final selection
🎓 February 2026: one-year long diploma course starts

Our cooperation with universities is an investment in long-term cybersecurity workforce development and we have more plans for the future how to make these courses available to more people in the region.

Governing Commercial Cyber Intrusion Capabilities (CCICs)

Today, December 12th, the Western Balkans Cyber Capacity Centre (WB3C) had the pleasure to host a training on Governing Commercial Cyber Intrusion Capabilities (CCICs).
Organized by the Ministère des Affaires étrangères français and implemented by Expertise France in the framework of a European Commission subvention under the Multi-Partner Contribution Agreement (MPCA) on Cyber and Artificial Intelligence, this training gathered diverse actors involved in the cybersecurity landscape of the Western Balkans region such as diplomats, magistrates and law enforcement officers to discuss the growing challenge posed by the proliferation and irresponsible use of CCICs.

Throughout the day, participants deep dived into the characteristics of the CCICs market and exchanged the need for strong governance frameworks:
1)     Assessing the threat and current trends in the global cyber intrusion market.
2)     Decoding the Pall Mall Process: ensuring government responsible use of commercial cyber intrusion capabilities.
3)     National CCIC governance frameworks: sharing of national experiences and identifying challenges and guidance.

Complementary to the other WB3C trainings, this workshop has contributed to advancing responsible governance of CCICs and strengthening accountability in the cyber domain. We thank the speakers Mahé Dersoir (Ministère des Affaires étrangères français), Robert Pellow (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office), James Shires and Lena Riecke for their precious contributions and expertise in the subject.
Moreover, we thank all participants for their active engagement and constructive exchanges, which are essential to continuously improve our collective understanding and oversight of CCICs.
We are grateful to our local partners Davide Meinero, PhD of the EU Delegation to Montenegro, Melanie Moffat of the British Embassy, Bertrand Baucher of the French Embassy and Gilles Schwoerer, Head of WB3C for supporting this initiative.

Darkweb, Crypto and OSINT Training for Police Academy Montenegro

Today, we are starting the third cycle of our specialized cybercrime training for 11 new cadets from the Police Academy of Montenegro. This ongoing initiative is building essential skills in digital investigations from the ground up.

The instruction comes directly from the field: our trainers, Yannick Casse and Cyril C. C, are serving officers from the French Gendarmerie and National Police, bringing real-world expertise to every session.
For today's police, digital literacy is as essential as field training. Building skills in OSINT, dark web monitoring and investigation and crypto-tracing isn't about specialization, it's about core competency because effective investigation requires understanding that in today's world evidence is digital, money is crypto and crimes leave traces on servers instead of streets.

The cadets will immerse themselves in digital investigation techniques over the next three days, and to solidify their learning, will conclude with a practical test, assessing their newfound skills in these critical areas.