MatchPoints 2024 brought together speakers and participants from both industry, public authorities, and particularly researchers from home and abroad. Naturally, several cybersecurity experts participated, but also people from entirely different fields such as social sciences and humanities were represented. Over two days in the beautiful surroundings of Aarhus, participants gained insight into cutting-edge new research and had the opportunity to engage in conversations on cybersecurity; about the latest advancements and the challenges we still need to address. Thus, attendees could gain insights on everything from new encryption possibilities to legal and sociological perspectives on cybersecurity and data usage, to considerations on how we should design our critical infrastructure.
The conference was opened in the Søauditorierne by Brian Bech Nielsen, the Rector of Aarhus University, Bas Spitters, Associate Professor at the Department of Computer Science and Chairman of the conference's program committee, and Lone Juric Sørensen, CTO of Aarhus Municipality.
This was followed by two jam-packed days with a diverse abundance of professional presentations, panel discussions, networking, and cultural evening events. Aarhus University's Department of Computer Science, one of the world's leading research environments in cryptography and secure software, had several researchers on the program.
"We look back on the conference with joy and pride that we could gather so many people to discuss such a complex field. We have raised significant awareness about the nature and extent of cyberattacks, but also instilled hope about the many solutions and countermeasures being developed within research," said Kaj Grønbæk, Head of the Department of Computer Science.
He participated in the conference's concluding panel debate, where discussions revolved around ensuring a high level of IT security for citizens and authorities, as well as how much control one is willing to relinquish in exchange for security and trust in our digital society. That same evening, a debate in Danish was arranged with Clement Kjersgaard and over 350 participants at the City Hall.
Cybersecurity increasingly affects all parts of society, and it was therefore quite fitting that MatchPoints concluded on Saturday with a broad public event at DOKK1. Here, expertise remained high, but presentations were made widely accessible - attendees could, for instance, learn to think like a hacker in a "capture-the-flag" competition, and children could hack each other's mini-golf robots. The great public interest shown demonstrated that MatchPoints 2024 succeeded in making the discussion on cybersecurity broadly relevant and accessible.
Since 2007, MatchPoints has been the annual flagship conference for Aarhus University, bringing together researchers, business leaders business professionals, journalists, politicians, and engaged citizens to discuss the most pressing issues of the day. The purpose of MatchPoints conferences is to create a dialogue between Aarhus University and the society around it on subjects of wider societal interests. The conferences are usually interdisciplinary.
The theme of MatchPoints 2024 was “Cybersecurity: How do we maintain trust in our digital society?”.
