In a pre-recorded speech played at the opening session of the Fifth Round of Arab Security Conference, the Minister of Communications and Information Technology Amr Talaat has underlined that cybersecurity is now one of the key pillars of the digital economy, which necessitates raising awareness of the seriousness of cyber threats.
The Conference is held under the auspices of Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly, on September 5-7, under the theme “Cybersecurity in the age of digital transformation.”
Talaat highlighted that applying the cybersecurity system in different state sectors and protecting the ICT infrastructure from cyber risks must be accompanied by society’s realization of the risks facing it with the growing number of smart devices and systems users and cyberattacks.
The ICT Minister added that the hard times that the world is going through due to the pandemic made technology the mainstay of managing businesses and transactions in societies, leading to an increase in the use of digital services and the reliance on electronic transactions.
The rapid shift towards the global digital economy and the digitization of operations, services, and commercial transactions led to a massive increase in cyberattacks with the high advancement in dark web techniques, in a way that enabled cybercriminals to go beyond borders, Talaat said.
In addition, the ICT Minister revealed that the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology (MCIT) is working to provide all the elements supporting the digital transformation. This includes carrying out projects to boost the information infrastructure, allowing broader access to information, and improving the quality of services. This comes in line with the state efforts to build Digital Egypt, which not only involves digitizing government services but also includes developing government performance and governing activities.
Talaat also stressed MCIT's keenness to provide a secure digital infrastructure with the government attaching great importance to cybersecurity and data security in line with the National Cybersecurity Strategy. This is achieved by creating a national system to secure cyberspace and train people to become cybersecurity specialists.
He pointed out that Egypt ranked 23rd out of 193 countries according to the Global Cybersecurity Index (GCI), scoring 95.48 points up from 88.3 in 2017, based on the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) Global Cybersecurity Agenda (GCA).
Source:
Ministry of Communications and Information Technology, Egypt
Date: September 05, 2021
mcit.gov.eg