GENEVA, Switzerland – 18 November 2021 – The annual Geneva Center for Security Policy (GCSP) awarded the CyberPeace Builders program the 1st Prize for Innovation in Global Security prize ceremony.
The Award was presented during an online ceremony and in the context of GCSP Innovation Day. The GCSP announced the winning results of its search to reward the most inspiring, innovative, and ground-breaking security contributions of the year.
The GCSP received a total of 113 project submissions in 2021 for the prize. After a strict evaluation process by the prize jury, with 15 shortlisted projects, the final three award recipients were selected.
The CyberPeace Institute, and the CyberPeace Builders program, are highly appreciative of the Award, which included CHF 10,000 and a GCSP Certificate of Excellence.
Initially tested in 2020 with institutions active in health, the CyberPeace Builders initiative was launched globally in 2021. It brings together corporate cyber security experts who volunteer to provide free cyber security assistance to humanitarian NGOs who often lack basic cyber protection. Indeed, it is estimated that only 1 in 10 Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) train staff regularly on cybersecurity. 3 out of 4 do not monitor networks, and 4 out of 5 do not have cyber security plans.
CyberPeace Builders’ objective is to assist over 1,000 NGOs worldwide by 2025.
Adrien Ogée, Chief Operating Officer of the CyberPeace Institute, stated: “This prize is a recognition of all the incredible people that make up the CyberPeace Builders, from the NGOs who realise how critical cyber security is for their operations, to the volunteers who give their valuable time and expertise and their companies that fund the programme and finally to the Institute employees who have designed and developed this programme. We are all contributing to making cyber space a safer place.”
The jury for the 2021 GCSP Prize for Innovation in Global Security included:
- Ambassador Nadine Olivieri Lozano, Head of the Division for Security Policy within the Directorate of Political Affairs in Bern
- Lt General (Retd) André Blattmann, Former Chief of the Swiss Armed Forces
- Ms Angela Kane, Senior Fellow at the Vienna Centre for Disarmament and Non-Proliferation
- Professor Jane Royston, Entrepreneur and member of the Swiss Science Council
- Ms Lauren Anderson, Founder and CEO of LC Anderson International Consulting and former FBI Executive
- Professor Nayef Al-Rodhan, Head of the Geopolitics and Global Futures Programme at the GCSP and Honorary Fellow at St Antony’s College, Oxford University
- Ambassador Thomas Greminger, Director of the GCSP
Further information on the CyberPeace Builders is available. If you would like to contact the reach, please reach out to Assistance(at)cyberpeaceinstitute.org
*** The original blog was published by GCSP and can be read here.