You have probably read all of the 2016 cybersecurity predictions by now and get the feeling that it will again be all gloomy like in previous years.
From my point of view there is not a single threat that will not get bigger or worse. With that in mind, I’d like to focus on the positive actions that we at APNIC are looking forward to doing in this area in 2016.
Dedicated Security Track at APRICOT and APNIC meetings
We did this last year at both APRICOT 2015, in Fukuoka, and APNIC 40, in Jakarta, where the attendance and feedback was great each time.
At this years APRICOT conference, we plan on running a week long security workshop, and will be hosting the FIRST Technical Colloquia, a forum at which FIRST members and guests can share information about vulnerabilities, incidents, tools and all other issues that affect the operation of incident response and security teams.
Supporting the regional security community
In 2016, we are looking forward to continuing our support of the CERT/CSIRT community in Asia Pacific, particularly the Asia Pacific Computer Emergency Response Team or APCERT. The relationship was strengthened in 2015 with the signing of an MoU at the APCERT Annual General Meeting in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
By supporting the CERT/CSIRT and security operations community, we hope to share with APNIC members their insights on the current threat landscape, best current practices (i.e. SAVE/BCP38), tools, and lessons learned from security incidents.
We also hope to have the security community contributing to the discussions in the technical tracks and policy meetings at APRICOT 2016 and APNIC 42.
Training regional CERTs/CSIRTs
Last year, we delivered six Basic Incident Response and Handling training workshops to our members and stakeholders, together with CyberSecure Pakistan, E-Learning, FIRST, IDSIRTII, JICA, KISA and RightsCon.
The main goal of the training is to help members enhance their incident response capabilities by either setting up a dedicated team for handling security incidents or improving their existing security response procedures.
In 2016, we have set our sights on delivering the training with our partners to more places in the region. So watch this space closely for more announcements!
In addition, we will continue to contribute to organizations such as INTERPOL and various inter-governmental forums by providing regional insights and awareness on security and other topics including IPv6, DNSSEC and RPKI. Having said that, we also hope to reach out to other security communities in the region.
Cybersecurity is certainly an important area and having a secure Internet is part of APNIC’s vision. So we hope to you see you at some of our events and help us spread more security love in the region.
The views expressed by the authors of this blog are their own and do not necessarily reflect the views of APNIC. Please note a Code of Conduct applies to this blog.