CyberNEMO

Using AI in Risk Management for AI-Supported IoT-Edge-Cloud Environments: When AI monitors AI in Critical Infrastructure

Building on the NEMO (Next Generation Meta Operating System) project, the CyberNEMO project strengthens end‑to‑end cybersecurity and trust across IoT-Edge-Cloud environments (often called the computing continuum). This EU‑funded research initiative brings together DNV and 22 partner organizations to advance cybersecurity resilience, risk preparedness, situational awareness, threat detection, and mitigation for critical infrastructure and its supply chains.

Building on the deliverables of the NEMO project – aimed at unleashing the power of artificial intelligence (AI) in IoT systems – CyberNEMO extends this foundation with robust security, trust, and governance mechanisms.

The project aligns strongly with the current and upcoming EU regulatory landscape, including the Cyber Resilience Act, the AI Act, the NIS2 Directive, and the Resilience of Critical Entities Directive. CyberNEMO addresses the new knowledge, practices, and solutions required by these regulations and is aligned with the broader EU cybersecurity strategy.

The project focuses on the needs in critical sectors, such as energy, water, healthcare, media, agrifood, and fintech, where cyber resilience is essential for societal stability and safety. 

Why CyberNEMO matters

As digital transformation accelerates across industries and organizations become increasingly interconnected, the need for robust end‑to‑end cybersecurity has never been more critical. Digital footprints and dependencies are expanding rapidly, and systems are growing in complexity. A rising number of digital assets, services, sub-contractors and stakeholders now contribute to an enterprise’s overall digital well‑being, business performance, and cybersecurity risk profile.

Cybersecurity risk can accumulate and cascade within a single organization, but it is also shaped by external dependencies. An organization’s risk state may be heavily influenced by – or even inherited from  – partners, subcontractors, external service providers, customers, and other actors within its ecosystem. When each of these actors adopts and deploys AI in the computing continuum, the resulting cybersecurity risk landscape becomes more complex. Entire value chains and value networks may be affected, requiring coordinated analysis, reporting, and mitigation at the enterprise, sector, national, or even EU level.

• CyberNEMO addresses these challenges by strengthening cybersecurity, operational resilience, and trust in complex, distributed, and AI‑enabled infrastructure.
• CyberNEMO develops advanced AI‑empowered cybersecurity controls and risk monitoring solutions. The risk management methodology and supporting technologies will be tested across multiple trials, where their impact on continuous risk management and certification processes will be evaluated. DNV will contribute with our auditor’s perspective throughout this testing phase.
• CyberNEMO introduces new methods, tools, data ecosystems, and collaborative models designed to better understand, manage, and mitigate both individual and collective cybersecurity risks across the computing continuum.

DNV’s role and strategic contribution

DNV is proud to be a key partner in CyberNEMO, a project dedicated to securing AI usage across the full computing continuum. Our strategic responsibility is to lead the development of CyberNEMO’s continuous cybersecurity risk management methodology.  This methodology is designed to be AI-empowered and automated, and to include new aspects that must be taken into account.  

Furthermore, it is designed to address the above-mentioned challenges by enabling organizations to identify the information required, which can then be used to perform analysis that create the necessary situational awareness. This is done to monitor and understand risk, report effectively, and select appropriate mitigation measures.

An important dimension is ensuring alignment of the method with upcoming EU legislation, such as the Cyber Resilience Act and the EU AI Act. Both regulations place strong emphasis on risk management and are supported by portfolios of harmonized standards. These standards will underpin conformity assessments – whether performed through self‑assessment or by accredited notified bodies like DNV.

Advancing cybersecurity technologies directly supports DNV’s strategic ambition to be a global leader in digital trust and cybersecurity assurance. Through CyberNEMO, DNV aims to both help solution providers manage emerging cybersecurity challenges and strengthen our own capabilities as a trusted third‑party cybersecurity auditor – a dual mission that underpins our commitment to digital trust.

The insights gained from the trials – where the CyberNEMO cybersecurity risk methodology, supporting tools, risk information repository, and API are evaluated – will be highly valuable for both DNV and our customers. These learnings will strengthen our ability to support customers on their digital transformation journeys and will also contribute to developing automated, AI‑driven support tools for DNV in our role as an independent cybersecurity auditor.

For DNV, CyberNEMO is a natural extension of our mission to safeguard life, property, and the environment. It reinforces our position as a trusted third party in the digital domain and supports our ambition to shape the future of cybersecurity assurance.

DNV continues to improve and digitalize our advisory, conformity, and certification processes and offerings. This development must be closely aligned with how our clients prepare for and implement their digitalization and certification strategies.

CyberNEMO deliverables

The project aims to develop a comprehensive cybersecurity framework spanning the entire digital computing continuum, from edge‑level sensors and operational technology (OT) to cloud infrastructures and data spaces. This includes AI‑empowered risk assessment methods and tools, microservices auditing, automated testing and deployment, and certification tools designed for cross‑border and cross‑industry use.

CyberNEMO develops a portfolio of cybersecurity controls and technologies designed to be deployed and tested on Kubernetes. Kubernetes, an open‑source container orchestration platform maintained by the Cloud Native Computing Foundation under the Linux Foundation, has seen rapid adoption growth in recent years due to its ability to automate deployment, scaling, and management of containerized applications.

Within cybersecurity, capability areas such as resilience, continuous risk management, preparedness, threat and vulnerability intelligence, detection, mitigation, and recovery are commonly recognized. Organizations including ENISA, CEN, and NIST maintain their own frameworks for these areas. Each capability area requires dedicated methods, knowledge, tools, data and data structures, and APIs. CyberNEMO will deliver multiple solutions that support and strengthen these capabilities.

The project offers end‑to‑end and full‑stack protection, from a foundational Zero‑Trust Network Access layer to an explainable AI‑empowered framework for situational perception, comprehension, and protection. It also includes collaborative microservices auditing, automated testing, certification, and accreditation processes.

Validation, penetration testing, and real‑world assessment will take place across six pilots representing critical infrastructure domains. All pilots emphasize cross‑domain and cross‑border federation. A dedicated CyberNEMO trial will support a pan‑European collaborative platform for Knowledge Sharing, Risk Assessment, Threat Analysis, and Incident Mitigation (SAAM).

By integrating zero‑trust architectures, AI‑empowered analytics, continuous cybersecurity risk management, and scalable certification frameworks, CyberNEMO is aligned with emerging EU regulations such as the Cyber Resilience Act, the AI Act, NIS2, and the Critical Entities Resilience Directive. The AI Act and Cyber Resilience Act are supported by harmonized standards, which will guide system providers and infrastructure operators in achieving conformity. DNV will apply these standards both in advisory services and when performing third‑party conformity assessments under the Cyber Resilience Act and the AI Act.

Building trust throughout the digital continuum

CyberNEMO is more than a research project – it is a proving ground for the future of continuous cybersecurity risk management empowered by AI. The project deals with cybersecurity of individual software or IoT devices, but the most significant contribution will probably come from the deliverables and knowledge developed on interconnected risk aspects merged from two axes. These axes are (i) interconnected organizations and (ii) the technology axis focusing on AI in the IoT-Edge-Cloud continuum. The project lifts the focus from individual product certification to how cybersecurity needs to be monitored and managed when used in the operation of critical infrastructures and high risk systems and value chains.

Project metadata:

The CyberNEMO project supplements the EU Horizon project 101070118 ΝΕΜΟ (Next Generation Meta OS). The NEMO project builds an IoT-Edge-Cloud continuum, in the form of an open-source, flexible, adaptable, and multi-technology meta-operating system.  Most of the cybersecurity functionality needed is made in the CyberNEMO project.

Click on the links below to read about related projects and initiatives