VIGIMARE Vigilant Maritime Surveillance of Critical Submarine Infrastructure

Summary

The European submarine networks are vital critical infrastructure for the EU member states. This submarine cable and pipeline network is crucial for the European society and any failure or damage to it could potentially have an enormous effect on the societies. Due to the rapidly evolving threat and geopolitical landscape, especially with incidents like the sabotage of the Nord Stream 1 and 2 gas infrastructure, organizations overseeing critical infrastructure face significant challenges. They must handle intentional threats while also grappling with growing problems caused by accidental and natural factors as well as climate change. These issues can worsen the effects of deliberate actions. To address these challenges effectively, it is crucial for these entities to implement resilience-enhancing measures.

The aim of VIGIMARE is to strengthen the resilience of Critical Infrastructure operators against threats to the European submarine critical infrastructure by developing, testing and evaluating an innovative solution to enhance security and reduce risks of physical and cyber-attacks on submarine cables and pipelines.

This will be accomplished by 1) mapping submarine systems, surveying cables and landing stations, and assessing vulnerabilities in the European submarine critical infrastructure network, 2) develop an automated threat detection approach, creating a real-time shared awareness of the surface above the submarine infrastructure to promptly indicate incidents to both critical infrastructure owners and member states authorities. By integrating a comprehensive resilience ecosystem with real incidents at sea, the project seeks to 3) identify early warning signals, support analysis, and pinpoint potential response activities to address physical, cyber and hybrid threats.

The result will be enhanced resilience for submarine critical infrastructure owners, supporting authorities to enforce the CER and NIS2 directives implementation in the EU member states.

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