What we do

Since 2012 Unitec’s Cybersecurity Research Centre has been developing technologies to make cyberspace safer for users. Our Cybersecurity Research Centre has been successful in winning both MBIE Endeavour Smart Ideas funding and participated in a major Research Programme. The Cybersecurity Research Centre has developed a strong suite of industry partners and academic collaborators and is now developing commercialisation opportunities. 

Solutions must be innovative enough to provide a competitive advantage and provide value to industry partners yet practical enough to be implemented and operated by small industry teams. The approach must involve integration into industry ecosystems, increased levels of technology readiness, and adaptability to the ever-changing needs of industry clients. To achieve this balance, a deeper level of engagement with industry partners is required. The research centre team must be involved in the industry and understand their needs to achieve a solution that is fit for the market, Te Pūkenga has much to offer in this area with its applied research and industry-partnered approach.

To meet this need, the Unitec Cybersecurity Research Centre has created its CybeR&DaaS initiative. CybeR&DaaS stands for Cybersecurity Research & Development as a Service. It is aimed at NZ organisations having a cybersecurity problem or opportunity that is outside of their normal area of business but which they need to address in an innovative but practical way.
The team at Unitec will explore the problem with the client, research novel approaches, and develop a proof of concepts, prototypes, and even beta products to explore new solutions. The aim is to provide effective approaches to real-world problems in shorter timeframes than most academic research projects. As such the Cybersecurity Research Centre at Unitec aims to occupy the middle ground between traditional computer science research and software development in the industry with translational, applied research solutions.

Research publications

  • From 2014 to 2021 the team at Unitec collaborated with the University of Waikato and the University of Auckland on the MBIE funded $12.2M STRATUS project to return control over their data back to cloud service users. We closely engaged with the industry during this project and learned that many industry problems are searching for solutions that are between the realm of academic research and standard commercial offerings.
  • In the field of cognitive computing and intelligent communications systems (CCICS) we collaborate with Japan’s leading high-tech research organisation, the National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT).
  • Together with industry partners, we developed the New Zealand Diploma in Cybersecurity for educating tomorrow’s cybersecurity experts.

Contact the Cybersecurity Research Centre

Cybersecurity Research Centre Director,Denis Lavrov dlavrov@unitec.ac.nz.
PGP Fingerprint: C055 8898 3FA4 A5E0 E0EE 476D BA79 E2B9 F572 8CA5.

Unitec’s Research Partner – Enterprise, Gregor Steinhorn gsteinhorn@unitec.ac.nz.

Physical address: We are located at Unitec, Te Whare Wānanga o Wairaka, 139 Carrington Road, Mount Albert, Auckland, New Zealand.

Three members of Unitec's cyber security research centre team pose

Professor Christian Probst, Denis Lavrov, and Gregor Steinhorn of Unitec's cybersecurity research centre. Photo: Matt Crawford.