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This article is part of a series that examines the coalition government's record of key issues in power and what the Labor Party promises to win in the 2019 federal election.
The government's chief cybersecurity coordinator, Alastair McGibbon, told a specialist audience in November 2018 that the prospect of a catastrophic cyber incident was:
the greatest existential threat we face as a society today.
Using a nautical metaphor, he said that such an event was not so far off the horizon, but could happen during the next wave. He cited what a technology expert has described as the most devastating computer attack in history, the NotPetya attack in 2017. NotPetya was a random attack one day which cost more than $ 400 million to a Danish company.
The latest disastrous government warning is appropriate, but its political responses have not been up to the challenge or their own commitments.
Read more:
Should cyber-leaders be required to tell victims of cybercrime that they have been hacked?
Cybersecurity is everyone's business
The government has been in a ministerial reorganization for 16 months to provide better cybersecurity responses, including through the new Department of Home Affairs. This department has been very busy with daily skirmishes in escalating clashes in cyberspace – ranging from Huawei's 5G policy, to foreign cyberattacks directed against members of the Australian Parliament.
However, the Ministry of the Interior is not alone in baduming broad responsibilities for cybersecurity policy. On the military side, the defense organization has taken decisive and disciplined action. In 2017, he announced the creation of a joint cyber unit of 1,000 people that should be in place by a decade ago. He also announced an increase in funding to increase the number of people occupying civil defense positions in cyber operations.
The Ministry of Education, which works with universities, the TAFE sector and schools, is another ministry with potentially heavy responsibilities. Unfortunately, he seems to lack action in cybersecurity.
The main plans are blocked
In April 2016, Prime Minister Turnbull published a national cyber security strategy. This included commitments to increase the cyber workforce (especially for women), develop the cybersecurity sector and undertake annual reviews of the strategy itself.
But in key places, ambitious plans seem to have failed or failed. Following the reversal of Turnbull, the post of Minister of Cybersecurity, created just two years ago, has disappeared. The annual review of the 2018 strategy has not been published, if at all. The annual threat report from the Australian Center for Cybersecurity (CCAA) was also missing in 2018.
In November 2018, AustCyber, a growth center for the sector, which is one of the good results of the 2016 strategy, released its second sector competitiveness plan. Typical government-funded agencies, it brings back a lot of good news. Australia is indeed an international power in cyber security. The report is not clear whether the government's strategy for 2016 has a lot to do with that.
Read more:
Why international law fails to keep pace with technology in the prevention of cyberattacks
Where we are missing
The AustCyber report for 2018 does not contain any data on women's participation in this sector after 2016, indicating that we are not on the right track. Reports from the decade before 2016 indicated a drop from 22% to 19% the government does not seem to follow this important commitment once it has been taken.
Another bad news is that the AustCyber report concludes that the education and labor goals have not been met. It is difficult to estimate how much, to the extent that the initial strategy of April 2016 has defined any reference level or measurement. AustCyber now badesses that:
The shortage of skilled labor in the Australian cybersecurity sector is more severe than initially anticipated and is already generating real economic costs.
AustCyber has reported a growth of 7% over the previous two years, about 3.5% per year. However, if the gap identified by the report needs to be filled, it should probably be around 10% per year for ten years:
The latest badessment indicates that Australia may need an additional 17,600 workers in cybersecurity by 2026 …
The government has spent $ 1.9 million over four years promoting cybersecurity university education in two Australian universities. This amount is so low that one might not even call it a drop of water in the ocean. As AustCyber suggests, although in moderate language, Australia has huge resource gaps in its cybersecurity education capabilities.
In my opinion, the most important gap is the almost total absence of university or professional training programs in advanced cyber-operations, the almost total absence of technical education institutions to support such programs, such as cyber-expanses, and cyber complex exercises.
What we should do
In 2018, at a national conference sponsored by the government, I said that Australia needed a national cyber war college and a reserve force. cyber-civil to drive the development of our human capital. I suggested at the time to create a college with a budget of 100 million Australian dollars a year. Based on a recent international research workshop at UNSW Canberra, I changed my estimate of cost and process.
Australia needs a cybersecurity education fund with an initial investment of about 1 billion Australian dollars to support a new cyber college. It should be networked across the country and independent of the control of existing educational institutions, while drawing on their expertise and that of the private sector.
It would be the nation's battery for future education in cybersecurity.
Read more:
The public has a vital role to play in preventing future cyberattacks
Work does not offer a better alternative
The Labor Party, through its Internet spokesperson, Gai Brodtmann, criticized the government's inability to fill the gaps. But she retires from the House of Representatives in the next election.
The workforce does not have well-developed policies or budget commitments that can fill the gaps. There is even reason to believe that the party has no seat in the limelight. Turnbull, the last cyber-champion that the Australian Parliament has seen for a while, does not seem to be so technologically oriented.
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