Since the start of the project in March 2024, the CyberUA project has been actively engaged with project partners in Ukraine to address outstanding matters related to cybercrime, electronic evidence and war crimes/gross human rights violations.

The inception phase of the project allowed the project team to try out different approaches to activities that could be used for further shaping of how the project operates in practice.

In terms of highlights in this early stage of the project, the following could be mentioned:

• Discussion on capacity building with key Ukrainian partners at the Cybercrime Programme Office (C-PROC) headquarters in Bucharest and support to the Cybersecurity Cluster Meeting in Bucharest, effectively putting the CyberUA project and its team on the map;
• Cooperation exercise in Kyiv with key institutions on handling evidence of war crimes during attack on critical infrastructure, which taught and tested the investigation and forensics skills in the scenario of real-time attack;
• Hybrid-format Training on admissibility, processing and chain of custody of e-evidence for prosecutors and judges in Kyiv, going to the core of legal matters of the CyberUA project;
• Hybrid-format Training on substantive law with regard to cyberattacks and the crime of aggression for key project partners, as first in series of dedicated discussion on the crime of aggression in the context of cyberattacks.

These activities have been also aided by dedicated research on admissibility of electronic evidence and open-source intelligence of war crimes/GHRV as well as substantive law matters related to the crime of aggression committed in the context of cyberattacks.

The lessons learned in this inception phase of the project have allowed the project to adjust its approach to organisation and planning of activities, now also aided by fully staffed project team in Kyiv.

 CyberUA Project webpage

 Cybercrime Programme Office of the Council of Europe

 The Convention on Cybercrime (Budapest Convention)