Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The Government has been doing a lot in this space in recent years and a number of Departments are contributing to that. The Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications, under the Minister, Deputy Eamon Ryan, is the primary Department involved, but the Defence Forces contribute to that. We have Defence Forces personnel at the NCSC. On a European level, there is also an awful lot of sharing of information. There is a centre of excellence in Tallinn, Estonia, for cybersecurity. We have seconded a person from the Defence Forces to that facility in terms of gaining knowledge. For a number of years, the Defence Forces and the State more generally have been increasing the resourcing of our cybersecurity defence capacity, and we continue to do that. The Defence Forces has a dual role here. We have to make sure that our systems are protected within the defence networks and, of course, we have to contribute to tackling the broader challenges the country faces. There is a lot of focus on that within the Government at present.

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