The Minister for Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science Simon Harris has announced funding of €3.75 million to boost further and higher education institutions’ defences against cyber-attack.

This funding will benefit the Higher Education system by providing around the clock monitoring and enhanced threat detection capabilities. 
 
Speaking about the funding allocation, Minister Harris has said:

“Higher Education institutions are not immune to cyber attack and we have seen the impact of this with the cyber-attack on Munster Technological University earlier this year.


“This new service will assist in protecting staff and students and strengthening the security of further and higher education institutions against potential threats.


“It is important to safeguard against any interruption to services so staff and students can securely access information, collaborate as well as facilitate digital literacy and distance learning.”

Operated by HEAnet, the service will allow institutions to quickly respond, contain and remediate security incidents.  The launch of the new Security Operations Center (SOC) and Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) service follows several recent high-profile cyberattacks nationally and takes into consideration the increasing level of cybersecurity threats facing the further and higher education sector. 


How this funding will benefit Trinity College Dublin 

Speaking about the new service, the Information Security Manager in Trinity College Dublin IT Services, Sara McAneney stated that:

“Trinity is delighted to have been selected to be a phase one client of the new service which is operated by HEAnet. IT Services has been working closely with HEAnet to roll out the service on the Trinity IT Network and is on track to be one of the first Universities to go live with the new service in late July 2023.

The service will provide 24/7 monitoring for security threats which will play a significant roll in protecting staff and students from the damaging impact of cyberattacks such as those seen in other higher education institutions in recent years.”


Read the Government announcement on gov.ie