The strategic Cybersecurity Research Program Flanders aims to deliver impactful solutions to real-world challenges, building upon a foundation of academic excellence. The program execution strengthens the existing core competences in cybersecurity research, while delivering building blocks and solutions that will benefit cybersecurity in industry. The research activities are executed by a research consortium formed by KU Leuven, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Universiteit Gent and IMEC, with a team of 200+ researchers.

The program is organized in four tracks:

·       Track 1 addresses Application and Software Security, aiming to support all stakeholders involved in analyzing, developing, and deploying new application software, by providing evolving technologies within the context of secure software development.

·        Track 2 includes Strategic Security Services, such as authentication, authorization, and services for data protection. The underlying concept is that security-specific building blocks will not be created entirely from scratch in new applications; instead, they should evolve in response to changing demands and expectations.  Additionally, research into policies, legal requirements, and compliance complements the technical work, providing the foundation for legal engineering.

·        Track 3, which centers on System and Infrastructure Security, specifically addresses secured technology packaged as a black box within operating systems or network layers. Software and service developers depend on the robustness and promising novel advances of these foundational layers.

·        Track 4 covers the Technology Building Blocks for Security, including secure hardware, cryptographic algorithms and protocols, and secure and efficient cryptographic implementations.  This research track combines theory and mathematics with practical implementations and evaluations in hardware and embedded software.

More information can be found on the website https://cybersecurity-research.be/.