Responding to increasing growth in cybercrime, Microsoft is demanding that governmental organizations, educational institutions and members of the private IT sector step up their game and move to a new level of coordination and integration. In this regard, the Redmond company, in collaboration with academia as well as law enforcement across Europe, has announced a new initiative that will result in the building of a network of cybercrime investigation Centres of Excellence. Microsoft has even made an appeal to the European Commission to facilitate university funding dedicated to training law enforcement agencies in scenarios involving cybercrime investigation techniques. In this manner, the EU will in fact support building the Cybercrime Centres of Excellence Network for Training, Research and Education (2CENTRE).

“Technological innovation, customer guidance and partnerships are essential to addressing the increasing complexities of cybercrime,” explained Tim Cranton, associate general counsel of Worldwide Internet Safety Programs at Microsoft. “The 2CENTRE universities will unite law enforcement, industry and academic expertise to provide an internationally coordinated cybercrime investigation training program for law enforcement agencies and the IT industry in the European Union and beyond.”

Microsoft emphasized that the Cybercrime Centres of Excellence Network for Training, Research and Education fit right into the European Union's own vision of establishing an EU cybercrime investigation training platform. The software giant emphasized that the 2CENTRE would serve to curve the loss in revenue to businesses, estimated by McAfee to have gone as high as $1 trillion in 2008.

“Through efforts such as Microsoft’s Trustworthy Computing principle, we are making technology more secure,” said Roger Halbheer, chief security advisor for Microsoft Europe, Middle East and Africa. “Though we have a long way to go and much more work to do, today it is a lot harder for cybercriminals to exploit weaknesses in our software. Unfortunately the bad guys don’t give up and go away. Instead they increasingly focus on crimes of deception that prey on human vulnerabilities rather than software vulnerabilities.”