“Sovereign Citizen Alliance (SOCIAL)”, Nr.2021-2-DE02-KA210-VET-000051512

Project No. 2021-2-DE02-KA210-VET-000051512             
Project title: „Sovereign Citizen Alliance (SOCIAL)”
Project duration: from 2022-05-01 to 2023-03-31
Project manager: prof. dr. Irena Zemaitaityte

The aim of the project: The present project strives to improve the readiness of European citizens for the digital age in supporting and building capacity development in the field of information security awareness, literacy and risk management. As stated in the recitals of the GDPR, the protection of basic freedoms and rights need to be realized by the protection of the digital identity. This objective lies at the core of this project idea. To achieve this end, the project will follow an iterative approach: First, by increasing awareness, participants will be informed and sensitized for safety critical behavior in the digital world. Second, by securing compliance, participants will learn to comply to certain behaviors and internalize safe work flows and conducts in the digital world. Further participants will be facilitated to identify breaches of their personal data and enforce their right of privacy. Finally, in the third stage, participants shall be enabled to truly “act sovereign”, i.e. to act upon their knowledge, to exert their citizen and judicial rights and to gain sovereignty about their digital actions and identity. Sovereignty in the digital realm means ownership and control over data and information. Fraudsters, criminals and malicious authorities are increasingly abusing the shortfall of proper risk understanding, weaponizing trusting individuals for their own benefit. To gain sovereignty about the own information therefore contributes to the security of businesses and individuals, to strengthen the democratic resilience in society and to ultimately secure the freedom of the European citizens in a digitalizing world. To achieve sovereignty, a bundle of minor measures can achieve a big difference. It is the aim of this project to convey these measures. Sensitive domains are currently identified especially in SMEs, where understanding for information security risks is lowest. The project therefore addresses these low-threshold environments, targeting European citizens and employees. Is has been established that the inclusion of digital skills needs to be strengthened in vocational curricula – this project therefore addresses the current gap by means of vocational education and training. On the job, the importance of sovereignty can most conveniently be addressed, and awareness rising achieved. Two concrete activities will achieve this goal: First, a transnational exchange of practices in education and the current state of digital sovereignty in the partner countries will be hold. Second, concrete measures of good practices will be transferred like the CISIS12 Information Security Management System, which specifically addresses SMEs and supports the uptake of information security understanding in low-threshold environments.