Ensuring cyber security a top priority: deputy minister

The Việt Nam Security Summit 2022 is organised in Hà Nội on Thursday— Photo hanoimoi.com.vn

HÀ NỘI — Ensuring cyber information security for digital platforms is a top priority and an integral task in the digital transformation process, said Deputy Minister of Information and Communications Nguyễn Huy Dũng at the Việt Nam Security Summit 2022.

The Việt Nam Security Summit 2022 is organised by the Authority of Information Security and IEC Group under the Ministry of Information and Communications chairmanship and held in Hà Nội on Thursday.

This is one of the most significant annual information security events in Việt Nam.

With the theme “Cyber security for national digital platforms: Creating a sustainable digital future,” the event aims to help leading domestic and foreign policymakers and strategists, experts and suppliers by providing solutions to meet, discuss and share to improve the capacity to respond to non-traditional cybersecurity risks and protect important digital platforms during the digital transformation process.

At the summit’s opening, Deputy Minister of Information and Communications Nguyễn Huy Dũng said that the theme was a topical and urgent issue when the process of national digital transformation, development strategy of digital services, digital economy and digital society were being deployed strongly in Việt Nam.

The process affirmed the country’s determination on digital transformation. The development, promotion and implementation of digital platforms were considered a breakthrough solution to accelerate the digital transformation process of Việt Nam, he added.

“Digital platforms are where the activities of agencies, organisations, businesses and people take place in the digital environment. Việt Nam’s digital platforms are also the national cyberspace, ensuring the safety of digital platforms and the safety of Việt Nam’s cyberspace. Therefore, ensuring network information security for digital platforms is considered a top priority and an integral task in the digital transformation process,” said Dũng.

The Deputy Minister also said that when digital platforms were deployed on a large scale and served a large number of people, they needed to withstand persistent attacks with increasing frequency and scale, more sophisticated technology and worse consequences.

The basic characteristics of the platform were sharing, a large number of users, and the generation of big data, including personal data and data of agencies and organisations. Therefore, he noted that digital platforms were the target of attackers in cyberspace.

In the past, organisations and businesses considered the development of applications with features according to user requirements as key, while information security was only an additional feature, he added.

Today, ensuring information security for platforms must be implemented right from the design stage as one of the most important features of the products, said Dũng.

He added that when building and developing national digital platforms, it was necessary to determine the level of information system security and implement a plan to ensure it by levels.

“To do this, platform developers must prioritise spending an appropriate proportion of expenses, we think at least about 20-30 per cent of the total investment, for cyber security features. With that, the cyber security assurance is carried out methodically, professionally, and without patchwork,” he said.

The Deputy Minister of the Ministry of Information and Communications also announced that the ministry was promoting, developing and using national digital platforms.

The ministry hopes that businesses providing digital platforms would accompany and participate in the programme towards developing a sustainable digital future, said Dũng.

Deputy Director of the Department of Cyber ​​Security and Crime Prevention using High Technology, Colonel Nguyễn Ngọc Cương, said that the explosion of smart devices and artificial intelligence was a threat to cyber security and social order and safety.

There was no comprehensive solution to ensure cyber security for IoT devices. The fourth industrial revolution presented both opportunities and challenges, he noted.

Therefore, we must seize and take advantage of opportunities, proactively prevent and respond to limit negative impacts, and ensure national defence, security, and sustainability of the country’s development process.

The Việt Nam Security Summit 2022 attracted more than 800 high-level delegates in charge of cyber information security and information technology from the Government and business sectors in fields such as finance, banking, insurance, telecommunications, retail, e-commerce, logistics, energy, and manufacturing. — VNS