Papua New Guinea’s network operators, newly-formed CERT and recently launched IXP have been benefitting from an intensive technical capacity building project launched to support preparations for the recently concluded APEC Summit and the impending arrival of the Coral Sea Cable System in 2019.
The APNIC Foundation and APNIC will continue the training program in 2019 after feedback from the local Internet technical community, as well as supporting additional capacity building and technical assistance initiatives with PNG CERT and PNG IXP.
The project, coordinated by The Asia Foundation (TAF) in partnership with the APNIC Foundation, is funded by grants from the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade. The project includes:
- A series of training workshops for the technical staff of local ISPs, mobile operators and government officers to promote best practices in network management. These technical training sessions are covering routing, network management and security, DNS, and information security.
- Technical support and training for the newly-formed PNG CERT, with a particular focus on incident response. The project will also draw PNG CERT into regular dialogues with other CERTs in the region, as well as ISPs, telcos and other key service providers.
- Technical support and training for PNG IXP to encourage greater ISP participation in the neutral Internet Exchange Point and development of the IXP community.
- A TAF high-level cybersecurity dialogue with government policymakers in parallel with the technical training, which was held from 26 to 28 September 2018.
As part of the project, three community consultations / technical assistance sessions and 10 training workshops have been held so far, engaging more than 200 members of PNG’s technical community. Additional training will be held in 2019 after an evaluation of the training in 2018.
As part of the project, representatives from PNG CERT also took part in security workshops at APNIC 46 in Nouméa in September, and APNIC participated in the TAF cybersecurity workshop in Port Moresby.
The project — the largest technical training program APNIC has been involved in at a national level — is a significant development opportunity for the PNG Internet community. The intensive training and support not only helped local operators prepare for the APEC meeting but also ensures the technical community is prepared for the increased bandwidth that will be provided by the new submarine cable and other investments.
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