Security and Privacy

From September 2002 to July 2007, this was the only I.T. security incident response team in Portugal with international accreditation. A second internationally-accredited team emerged in July 2007, namely CSIRT.FEUP (site in Portuguese) of the Faculty of Engineering at the Universidade do Porto.

In July 2008, the Instituto Pedro Nunes Systems Informatics Laboratory’s CERT.IPN (site in Portuguese) also joined the list of CSIRTs (Computer Security Incident Response Teams) maintained by TERENA – Trans-European Research and Education Networking Association, although it is not yet accredited. The Instituto Pedro Nunes is a private, not-for-profit institution of public use, set up under a Universidade de Coimbra initiative in 1991. Its mission is technology transfer between the University and the Portuguese economic fabric.

It has also been foreseen that the FCCN shall make an anti-SPAM platform available. This will be created in conjunction with other bodies, namely IP service providers and operators.

The State Electronic Certification System – Public Key Infrastructure (SCEE) was set up in June 2006 to provide electronic signatures for public bodies and Central Administration services and organisms or other bodies that carry out certification for public purposes (Decree Law No. 116-A/2006 (text in Portuguese), of 16th June). Overall management of the SCEE was referred to a Managing Board chaired by Minister of the Presidency and composed of representatives from Knowledge Society Agency (UMIC), the Government Computer Network Management Centre (CEGER) (site in Portuguese), the FCCN - Foundation for National Scientific Computation (site in Portuguese), the National Security Office (GNS), the ICP— National Communications Authority (ICP—ANACOM), the Informatics Institute (II), the Telecommunications Institute (IT), the Information Technologies Institute in Justice (ITIJ) (site in Portuguese), the National Internal Security Network, and the Administrative Modernisation Coordination Unit (UCMA) - this representation was later transferred in May 2007 to the Agency for Administrative Modernisation (AMA) (site in Portuguese).

The SCEE is in charge of operating a Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) and issuing and managing electronic signatures in Central Government, which, in addition to issuing electronic signatures for the Citizen’s Card and the Portuguese Electronic Passport, will enable the legislative process to become completely virtual.

The setting up of the SCEE was monitored by a Working Party made up in exactly the same way as the SCEE Managing Board mentioned above, as stipulated in Council of Ministers' Resolution No. 171/2005 (text in Portuguese), of 3rd November, which approved the creation of the State Electronic Certification Body – Public Key Infrastructure (ECEE) and which launched its set-up process. Knowledge Society Agency (UMIC) has played a very active role in the work of this Working Party, which created the State PKI in record time – to be more precise, in under seven and a half months. It was after advice from UMIC that the aforementioned Council of Ministers' Resolution stipulated that this infrastructure  should be set up quickly. The initial proposal foresaw a year of preliminary studies before moving onto the setting-up phase. Through taking this advice, it was possible to set up the State Electronic Certification Body’s PKI in roughly a third of the time that was being suggested at that point.

Knowledge Society Agency (UMIC), the FCCN - Foundation for National Scientific Computation (site in Portuguese) and Microsoft Portugal signed a computer security agreement to exchange information on a monthly basis about computer security incidents and to ensure a joined-up joint response to emergencies. This agreement is being instituted through the adoption of monthly procedures involving the three bodies.With the aim of promoting critical, enlightened and Safer Internet use by children and young people, families, workers and citizens in general, Knowledge Society Agency (UMIC), the Directorate-General for Innovation and Curricular Development/ Computers, Networks and Internet at School Mission Team (DGIDC/CRIE), the FCCN - Foundation for National Scientific Computation (site in Portuguese) and Microsoft Portugal have submitted an application to promote and raise the public’s awareness of Safer Internet use with a project called Internet Segura (Safer Internet) in the scope of the European programme, Safer Internet Plus. The UMIC-coordinated consortium was set up to spread the strategy started by DGIDC/CRIE (site in Portuguese) in schools and the educational community, in the scope of the SeguraNet (site in Portuguese) project under the original Safer Internet programme, extending awareness-raising schemes and promoting Safer Internet use in other sectors of society, as well as creating a hotline for people to report the locations of illegal user content. The Internet Segura (Safer Internet) project was launched at the beginning of 2007 and organised the activities for the European Safer Internet Day on 6th February 2007. After the corresponding contract was signed by the European Commission and the consortium in June 2007, the Public Presentation of the Internet Segura (Safer Net) Project was held on 5th July 2007. This included the presentation of the Internet Segura (Safer Internet) Portal (site in Portuguese) which provides information on safe use of the Internet and other information and communication technologies for the general public in easy to understand language, and the unveiling of the Internet Segura (Safer Internet) Hotline (site in Portuguese) which institutes the hotline mentioned above. The Internet Segura (Safer Internet) project organised the activities for European Safer Internet Day 2008 (text in Portuguese) on 12th February 2008.