Queen's University nets £25 million funds for cybersecurity research
Belfast’s Queen University receives funding to open the new Center for Secure Information Technologies (CSIT) which will do research in areas including data encryption, network security, wireless security, and “intelligent surveillance technology”
Good news for Northern Ireland. Queen’s University Belfast has secured £25 million in funding to help it become the U.K.’s leading center in developing technology to thwart Internet attacks. The new Center for Secure Information Technologies (CSIT) will be based at the Queen’s Institute of Electronics, Communications and Information Technology (ECIT) in the Northern Ireland Science Park, Belfast. The center will specialize in research in areas including data encryption, network security, wireless security, and “intelligent surveillance technology.” It is intended to develop technologies for both the home and enterprises.
The Register’s John Leyden writes that other areas of interest include developing processors for detecting and filtering computer viruses and protecting databases from crackers. Outside of information security, the development of high-definition streaming video services is also on the agenda.
“The new Center at ECIT will develop secure solutions to a number of particularly modern problems including the protection of mobile phone networks, guaranteeing privacy over insecure networks for connected health care and the creation of secure ‘corridors’ for the seamless and rapid transit of people, thus getting around the need for conventional security at airports,” explained Professor John McCanny, director of ECIT, said in a statement. “Although only four years old, ECIT has already achieved many world-class scientific breakthroughs and helped create many new spin-out companies. The new Center will realize the full potential of emerging technologies, ensuring Queen’s and the U.K. is the first to develop such cutting-edge research,” he added.
Funding for the center comes from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (£6.95 million), the Technology Strategy Board (£2.5 million), industry (£7 million) and Queen’s University itself (£8.8 million). Ministers hope the center will pay back many times its funding costs in contributions to the development of the UK IT economy. U.K. minister of state for science and innovation, Lord Drayson, said investment in the center “will foster an entrepreneurial environment where ground-breaking research can mix at an early stage with business and potential customers”.
