CYBERSECURITY STRATEGY OF THE REPUBLIC OF CYPRUS 2012 CERTs/CSIRTs into these cooperation mechanisms, their full functionality must be ensured so that they may gain the necessary certifications to allow their participated in relevant European working groups. Action 10 - Phase A – Ensure the full functionality of Computer Emergency Response Teams (CERTs/CSIRTs), with immediate priority for the operation of the Governments CERT/CSIRT. Necessary certifications and memberships will be obtained to allow their participation in relevant European working groups. Action 11 - Phase B – Assessment by OCECPR, in cooperation with the CERTs/CSIRTs, of expanding their activities or creating new CERTs/CSIRTs to cover the needs of the private sector and the business community. 3.10 National and International Cyber Exercises The significant need for cooperation between the government and different stakeholders, both within the public and private sectors, has been examined in sections 3.3 and 3.5. The development of this cooperation, and especially of associated trust, is of the utmost importance. However, it is not enough to just create the necessary cooperation mechanisms, if these mechanisms are not assessed and tested on a regular basis, especially via the emulation of crisis situations. The completion of such exercises has proven to be a very valuable tool for ensuring the readiness levels of the competent authorities to handle a potential crisis, e.g. the loss of a significant part of a large communications network. Exercises that have been conducted so far in other member states, and also on a pan-European level, have shown that the mechanisms to face such a crisis already exist; the missing piece of the puzzle is usually the cooperation and coordination modalities between the competent authorities involved, i.e. who will communicate with whom in a crisis situation, how can rapid cooperation between the involved authorities specifically be achieved, etc. The need for completing cyber exercises that involve handling realistic scenarios (where the players involved have no a priori knowledge of the events that are to follow) has been recognised on the European level and the first pan-European cyber exercise (Cyber Europe 2010) has already taken place. The Republic of Cyprus has much to gain for organising and actively participating in such cyber exercises. Naturally, this gain is maximised with the organisation of similar national exercises with realistic scenarios. The completing of such exercises will contribute to the maximisation of the Republic’s readiness levels to withstand significant events in the area of network and information security that could potentially affect a large part of the population. 23