ScotlandIS Cyber

The biggest cyber security festival in the North is back!

Now in its 9th year, CyberFest is a month-long celebration showcasing the North East’s cyber and AI excellence. Taking place across the North East, its mission is to connect, educate, and empower the region’s digital ecosystem through high-impact events and community collaboration. Throughout October, the festival will bring together the leading experts across Space, Defence, Energy, AI, and Manufacturing to showcase the power of cross-sector collaboration.

Key statistics

● Meet new people: 1,000+ CyberFest attendees last year

● Gain business opportunities: 600+ businesses in CyberNorth’s networks

● Put your business in front of a large social media network: 5,200+ followers on CyberNorth’s LinkedIn

What is the Community Conference

This year the Community Conference is focused on putting the spotlight on cyber security in frontier technology. We’ll be hearing from local, national, international, and government speakers from a number of different perspectives across the sector’s most pressing topics.

We’re also bringing cyber, space and defence clusters, businesses, and professionals from around the nation together to connect, network and engage with the North East cyber security and AI industry, and to showcase what we have to offer in the region.

In the afternoon, attendees will also be invited to participate in collaborative workshops across a variety of disciplines. Conference attendees gain free access to afternoon sessions.

The tracks include Space, Defence, AI, Advanced Manufacturing and Energy.

Ready to unlock new opportunities across key sectors in the North East? Put Monday 19th October in the diary.

For business leaders and those with responsibility for data privacy and cyber security within an organisation, it can feel like the goalposts are always moving.

Policies and protections that used to be “once and done” are constantly needing renewed and updated and the toolkit organisations need to protect themselves for ever-evolving threats is becoming more complicated.

Join us at the Everyman Cinema in Edinburgh for our next Data & Cyber Conference where we’ll set out the current legal and regulatory landscape and then provide you with some practical solutions and advice to be prepared – all based on lived experience rather than just theory.

Our conference will include a general legal update, plus sessions on managed services providers, group data protection claims, DSARs and complaints, AI governance and more, with some special guest speakers – to be announced soon!

The conference will be valuable for business leaders and those with responsibility for data protection, cyber security, risk, compliance or legal governance, and will be relevant to all sectors.

Join senior leaders and professionals from across cyber security, IT, risk and digital transformation for an evening of meaningful conversations, expert insight and high-quality networking in the heart of Edinburgh.

Hosted by i-confidential, Cyber Connect brings together practitioners, security leaders and decision-makers to explore the challenges shaping the future of cyber security – from AI and operational technology to emerging legislation, resilience and the evolving threat landscape.

Why attend?

• Connect with cyber, IT and risk professionals from across Scotland.
• Hear practical, thought-provoking talks from recognised industry experts.
• Expand your network in an informal setting with senior leaders and peers.
• Meet the i-confidential team and discover the work we’re doing across the cyber community.

The Evening

Our 2026 speaker programme is ready to be unveiled, with a line-up of influential voices covering topics such as:

• Artificial Intelligence & Emerging Technologies
• Space & Critical Infrastructure
• Operational Technology (OT) Security
• Cyber Risk, Governance & Legislation

We’ll be announcing our full speaker line-up over the coming weeks, so keep an eye out for the announcements.

R&D tax credits are designed to support innovation, but many Scottish technology companies are facing growing uncertainty around eligibility, evidence, compliance and HMRC enquiries.

This roundtable will bring together ScotlandIS members to share practical experiences, identify common challenges and explore how the system could work more effectively for innovative companies.

The discussion will help ScotlandIS develop an evidence base to support future engagement with government and HMRC, ensuring the voice of Scotland’s tech sector is clearly represented.

This is an interactive session so that you can provide your feedback. We would encourage you to join with your camera and mic on.

ScotlandIS is working with Third Sector Lab to help connect more of Scotland’s technology community with charities and third-sector organisations through the Digital Trustees programme.

Digital is now part of almost every board-level conversation — from cyber security and data to AI, digital services and organisational resilience. But many charities and third-sector organisations don’t always have that knowledge represented around the board table. The Digital Trustees programme helps organisations identify the digital skills and experience they need and connects them with professionals who can bring that expertise as trustees or board advisers.

In this informal webinar, ScotlandIS and Third Sector Lab will explain how the programme works, what being a Digital Trustee actually involves and how people from across the technology sector can get involved.

We’ll also look at how employers can maximise the impact of employee volunteering by supporting people into trustee and board roles — creating meaningful opportunities for staff to use their skills, develop leadership and governance experience, and make a tangible contribution to the third sector.

We’ll cover:

• what charities are looking for from Digital Trustees;
• what the trustee role involves in practice;
• why you don’t need to be a charity or governance expert to contribute;
• how experience in areas such as technology, cyber, data, AI and digital transformation can add value at board level;
• what technology professionals can gain personally and professionally from becoming a trustee;
• how employers can use board and trustee opportunities as part of their employee volunteering, development and social impact activity; and
• how Third Sector Lab supports both individuals and organisations through the matching process.

This isn’t about joining a board and being expected to “fix the technology”. It’s about bringing a digital perspective to the wider conversation — helping boards ask better questions, understand risk and make better-informed decisions.

For technology professionals, it’s also an opportunity to use your experience in a completely different environment, develop your leadership and governance skills, broaden your network and make a tangible contribution to an organisation or cause you care about.

For employers, it can also provide a more strategic form of employee volunteering — one that creates real value for charities while supporting staff development, engagement and wider social impact.

Who should attend?

This session is particularly relevant to people working across technology, cyber security, data, AI, software, digital transformation, product, design and digital leadership.

It will also be useful for employers, people leaders and CSR/ESG teams interested in creating more meaningful volunteering and leadership-development opportunities for their staff.

You don’t need previous trustee experience — just an interest in using your knowledge and experience to help another organisation.