In Chilean Patagonia: ANCI launches the first cybersecurity strengthening project for Latin America and the Caribbean
Between May 28th and 30th, government representatives and experts from 10 countries of the region gathered in Puerto Varas to kickstart the "Strengthening and Development of Capabilities in Latin America and the Caribbean with regard to Cybersecurity" project, that seeks to improve the digital security preparedness of Latin America and the Caribbean, leveraging what Chile learned during the development of their own Cybersecurity Framework Act, and the implementation of their National Cybersecurity Agency (ANCI).
To achive that goal, this initiative will, during a 24 months period, carry out a series of activities that will accelerate the development of regulatory capabilities, the exchange of best practices and the design of regulatory tools in the participating countries.
The first of these activities was a regional workshop attended by cybersecurity representatives of Argentina, Brasil, Ecuador, Colombia, Costa Rica, Jamaica, Mexico, Panama, Perú and the Dominican Republic
Daniel Álvarez Valenzuela, ANCI Director, values this project because it "will allow us to build an space for regional dialogue with the leaders and cybersecurity authorities in 10 countries of Latin America and the Caribbean. And this dialogue is indispensable to move towards a common regulatory model that shares some elements of the national cybersecurity regulations, that will allow us to deal with the challenges in cybersecurity in a more consistent and coordinated way at an international level".
The Ambassador of the European Union in Chile, Claudia Gintersdorfer, thinks that "this project, that seeks the strengthening of capabilities needed to consolidate the regional governance in cybersecurity, is a concrete and valuable contribution by Chile to the EU-LAC Digital Alliance. Cyberthreats go beyond borders and demand a coordinated response that gets countries together to protect their public entities as well as private, in the event of any cyberspace contingency.
This initiative is financed by the European Union (EU), within the framework of the EU-LAC Digital Alliance, and implemented by ANCI with support of the Chilean Agency of International Cooperation for Development (AGCID).
"From the Chilean Agency of International Cooperation for Development (AGCID) we are confident this project will answer the needs of participating countries in the subject of cybersecurity, and that the technical cooperation will contribute to create meeting spaces between the countries of this region. Also, we expect to share and learn from the experiences of all those participating, something that will strengthen capabilities in a national and regional level", said the executive director of AGCID, Enrique O'Farrill.
On the whole, this project contemplates intensive training, the development of working papers, a model cybersecurity law proposal, spaces for biregional dialog and the development of empirical research.
The first workshop dealt with regulatory frameworks and public governance models in cybersecurity, taking the European experience as reference —particularly the NIS2 Directive—, presented the current situation of cybersecurity policies and the regulatory frameworks of participating countries, and the institutional breakthoughs in Chile after the Cybersecurity Framework Law was approved.
This event takes place within the commitments Chile has in terms of biregional cooperation in the subject of cybersecurity. It also constitutes a space for political-technical dialogue about the regulatory progress in Latin America and the Caribbean.