Govt to boost measures to counter cybersecurity threats

By Tan WeiZhen, TODAY, 27 Aug 2014

In the wake of recent large-scale global cybersecurity breaches, the Government has unveiled a raft of measures to counter such threats to the Republic, including beefing up detection capabilities.

The tightening of Singapore’s defence against heightened cybersecurity threats, announced yesterday by Communications and Information Minister Yaacob Ibrahim, includes the setting up of a Monitoring and Operations Control Centre.

Its role is to coordinate activities and operations against such threats and use the results of investigations to execute measures against potential attacks on the entire government infrastructure, said the Infocomm Development Authority (IDA).

“(The centre will) provide the Government with a full suite of capabilities to guard against security threats and respond to them in a timely manner,” said Dr Yaacob at the opening of the Infocomm Security Seminar yesterday.

He cited the theft of credit card details of millions of customers of American retailer Target and the discovery of the Heartbleed bug, which left two-thirds of the world’s websites vulnerable to cyberattack, as examples that warranted higher vigilance and the beefing up of the security of infrastructure and systems.

In Singapore, there were attempts last year to bring down or deface government web pages, including those of the Prime Minister’s Office and the Istana.

The Cyber-Watch Centre — set up in 2007 to monitor critical public-sector IT installations around the clock — will be upgraded by January next year so it can better monitor unauthorised changes to government websites, such as defacements, and sniff out malware and leakage of sensitive data.

Chief information security officers will be appointed to strengthen the infocomm security governance in government agencies, Dr Yaacob added. This is in addition to the chief information officers already appointed in statutory boards.

On the part of the IDA, it will aim to increase the number of cybersecurity professionals here, at both the degree and diploma levels.

For instance, the Singapore Institute of Technology will be starting the first undergraduate information security degree programme in September next year, Dr Yaacob announced yesterday. The four-year programme will take in 50 undergraduates a year.

Nanyang Technological University has included an information security specialisation programme as part of its undergraduate curriculum this month, with more than 30 per cent of the final-year cohort opting for it.

Two new diploma programmes will be offered next year — a diploma in digital forensics at Temasek Polytechnic and a diploma in information security and forensics option at Ngee Ann Polytechnic.

Dr Yaacob said that at the post-degree level, manpower will also be boosted to develop a pool of postgraduate researchers and technologists who will create solutions in this field.

The training of manpower was a welcome move for the industry, which has been confronted with a shortfall of such professionals.

Mr Wally Lee, president of the Association of Information Security Professionals, said: “We have not been able to find the right candidates at the degree or diploma level. In general, the pool of security professionals here is very small ... and some people who study related courses may end up doing something else, so it is good that we can have a bigger pool.”