Unlocking Cybersecurity Potential in Civil and Defence Domains in Slovenia
Slovenia has built a regulatory and institutional foundation that is well aligned with EU standards, with established actors across government, industry, and academia and active participation in European and NATO-level programmes.
The argument of this COcyber white paper, authored by Ines Vlahović and Mihael Nagelj from our partner CCIS – Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Slovenia, is the difficulty of making these entities work together, synthesising the findings of the Slovenian national case study into a policy-oriented assessment of the country's cybersecurity ecosystem.
The paper identifies fragmentation as the hardest barrier to break. Responsibilities are dispersed, coordination is often ad hoc, and the most effective information exchanges regularly occur through informal channels (what stakeholders describe as the "phonebook system") rather than through formal and consequently safer platforms.
Combined with a structural skills shortage, below-EU-average public investment in R&D, and limited venture capital for cybersecurity innovation, this creates a system that is reactive rather than strategic, capable in parts but disconnected as a whole.
The authors outline a path forward: in the short term, strengthening communication and cooperation between government, industry, and academia; in the medium term, building stable cooperation frameworks and aligned incentives for knowledge exchange and joint capability development; and over the longer term, securing the political commitment and investment needed to establish cybersecurity as a national priority.
As the paper concludes, resilience in cybersecurity is achieved only when individual capabilities are connected into a well-functioning system.
