A RECENT statement by Joe Biden shows that the US President fully understands the importance of Cybersecurity. 

Writing from the White House, Biden reiterated these words, showing the seriousness of cyberattacks on the country.  

“I have previously warned about the potential that Russia could conduct malicious cyber activity against the United States, including as a response to the unprecedented economic costs we’ve imposed on Russia alongside our allies and partners,” he said. 

For this reason, Biden said that from the onset, his administration has worked “to strengthen (the country’s) national cyber defences, mandating extensive cybersecurity measures for the Federal Government and those critical infrastructure sectors”. 

They have also forged innovative public-private partnerships and initiatives to enhance cybersecurity across all our critical infrastructure. 

However, this has unfortunately not caught on sufficiently in the developing nations, despite knowing that an entire economy can be severely impacted by hackers, whether working independently or sponsored by the government. 

The recent conflict between Russia and Ukraine is a good example, where the war was not only on the ground or in the air, but in cyberspace. There were intensified efforts to attack each other’s cyber infrastructure. 

Another recent example is when the hackers were able to gain access to computers at two dozen major gas suppliers and exporters. Chevron Corp, Cheniere Energy Inc and Kinder Morgan Inc were named by Bloomberg News in its report. 

These attacks not only coincided but “occurred on the eve of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, when energy markets were already roiled by tight supplies”. Technology enables acts causing chaos to an entire nation by attacking its critical sectors. 

Those in cybersecurity understand the impact of sectoral cyberattacks carried out by professional hackers.  

Among the sectors that are most vulnerable are the financial sector, defence, communications, energy, transport, health, to name a few. These are critical sectors of each nation. 

Often these attackers target multiple entities within a sector. This form of attack has increasingly become the norm.  

The likely impact is much larger relatively, be it financially or operationally (shutdown). A major cyberattack could cause chaos and significant disruptions in the country, not to mention financial and reputational losses. 

In Malaysia, Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) has set up its Fintip platform to link the entire financial sector in a collaborative effort to fend off cyberattacks. 

A sectoral security platform such as SectorGard is useful for other regulators to mitigate cyber risks for the sector under their purview. 

Rather than on a piecemeal basis, cybersecurity can be looked at as an entire sector, bringing together the sector members to provide the capability to defend itself against malicious cyberattacks. 

Such a sectoral security platform is useful for other regulators to safeguard the sector under their purview.  

All nations should place an emphasis into cybersecurity of the critical sectors, instead of looking at national defence purely from the physical angle. – April 3, 2022 

Aziz Hussein is the Business Development Director of Tecforte Sdn Bhd, an MSC status company based out of Petaling Jaya, Selangor. 

https://focusmalaysia.my/rethinking-malaysias-cybersecurity-strategy/