Petaling Jaya: Akshay Joshi, director of the World Economic Forum Center for Cybersecurity, said Malaysia needs to take an ecosystem-wide approach through information sharing among stakeholders to build industry-wide cyber resilience.
“To strengthen the cyber posture of our industry as a whole, we need to share information among ourselves,” he said in an exclusive video interview at the recent Global Cyber Security Forum in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Ta.
He said legitimate businesses, especially financial institutions, need to cooperate with each other to counter threats because adversaries can share information at scale in real time.
“Our adversaries don’t have as many institutional barriers to cooperation as our good guys. How can we remove those barriers and enable us to cooperate with each other? We can understand the risks at hand and then collectively address them. It will be like that,” Akshay said.
He noted that the Malaysian government is making significant investments in strengthening its cybersecurity capabilities, particularly the Financial Inclusion Alliance in Kuala Lumpur, which has made significant investments in capacity building initiatives.
Regarding users who have suffered financial loss due to personal data breaches, Akshay said this is a complex issue as it straddles the private and public sectors and involves “mechanisms that could work”. Ta.
“For example, in the UK, if there is a victim, there is always a refund, but the burden is shared by both the bank that initiated the transaction and the bank that received the transaction.
“This is a complex issue and it will take a lot of collaboration between the public and private sectors to put mechanisms in place,” Akshay said.
He added that more needs to be done to address consumer awareness and behavior online.
“People are embracing technology, but are they aware of the checks and balances as well as the hygiene controls required to operate safely within cyberspace?” he asked.
On the role of artificial intelligence (AI) in cybersecurity, Akshay said the technology is used by both defenders and attackers.
He observed that attackers and adversaries are starting to use AI as a way to fine-tune their deceptions to further persuade potential victims. For example, spam emails used to be easily identified by misspellings and grammatical errors. However, through generative AI, attackers can create persuasive text and make clear arguments to their victims.
“That said, there is a lot that AI can do in terms of enabling defenders to defend better. As we understand the technology, we are integrating it within enterprises and even security organizations. start.
“In the short term, we may find that attackers may jump a little bit just with the pace of their activity, but in the long term, I think these technologies will provide balance to the environment. I’m very optimistic, it’s in the defenders’ favor,” Akshay said.
He emphasized that cybersecurity should be prioritized at the board level of all organizations and treated as a business risk.
“Cybersecurity needs to be on the board-level agenda for all organizations and is no longer something that is just handled at a technical level,” he added.