Cyber Security Weekly Podcast

Recognised by the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), Motorola Solutions has established a cyber threat Information Sharing and Analysis Organisation (ISAO) to provide public safety agencies the capabilities they need to defend against attacks.

Since January 2022, Motorola Solutions’ Public Safety Threat Alliance observed 350+ cyber attacks impacting public safety organisations worldwide, often resulting in downtime of critical services.

Cyber attacks against public safety agencies increased in both 2021 and 2022, with 2022 seeing a 700 percent increase in distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks for public safety organisations and a 179 percent increase in hacktivist activity.

In many Australian states and territories, emergency services use the Motorola Solutions Land Mobile Radio (LMR) communication networks and devices as well as their managed services to help maintain reliable voice and data communications and keep their technology securely and optimised, 24 x 7.

However, LMR networks and other critical infrastructures can also be targeted by threat actors (e.g. critical infrastructures including utilities being targeted in the war in Ukraine)

Motorola Solutions continues to grow and invest in its portfolio of communications, software and video security products including our cyber security offerings. The ActiveEye platform monitors about 1M cyber attack events on public safety networks each month, with 98 percent auto-triaged by artificial intelligence, and the rest looked at by cybersecurity experts on our team to determine how to mitigate risks.

Among Australian customers already using these cyber services are the NSW Telco Authority for which Motorola Solutions are providing a comprehensive suite of public safety services for PSN, including network lifecycle upgrades and 24 x 7 cybersecurity, helping to keep this mission-critical technology up-to-date, secure and performing reliably in any situation.

For more information and to get involved, visit Public Safety Threat Alliance -https://www.motorolasolutions.com/psta

#motorola #cybersecurity #mysecuritytv #publicsafety #motorolasolutions

Brendan is a cyber security expert with more than 20 years of experience in the financial sector and U.S. intelligence community, including leadership roles as the founder and CEO of a successful startup and an executive at the National Security Agency. He has a deep knowledge of advanced cyber threat actors, threat hunting, financial sector systemic risks, and risk management best practices.

In this interview, Brendan shared his perspectives on cybersecurity skills, threats and budgets.

Reflecting on his career at the NSA from 2002 to 2013 and essential cybersecurity skills, Brendan emphasized the importance of curiosity, analytical thinking, and adaptability, which he believes are still relevant in today's cybersecurity landscape.

When it comes to the question of whether cyber threat actors possess greater expertise than cyber defenders, Brendan suggested that they strive to utilize their resources as effectively as possible to breach networks. From this standpoint, they share similarities with other criminals who possess the necessary skills to perpetuate their criminal activities.

For cyber defenders also seeking to optimise the return on investments, he noted the challenge of quantifying cybersecurity investments and the need to tailor metrics for different companies and industries.

On the topical theme of AI in cybersecurity, Brendan highlighted the potential of AI, particularly in threat intelligence characterization and customer engagement. He also mentioned the challenges of AI models and their potential use by threat actors.

He also shared his experiences starting a company and raising funds, and the value of Information Sharing and Analysis Centers (ISACs) and various industry-specific information-sharing groups.

Recorded 26th Sept 2023, 5.30pm, Asia Square Singapore.

#mysecuritytv #cybersecurity #isac

We speak with Bugcrowd CEO Dave Gerry in Sydney as he visits Australia to meet with partners and customers.

Bugcrowd, a multi-solution crowdsourced cybersecurity platform, has also announced significant global customer momentum, highlighting the market need for Bugcrowd’s crowdsourced cybersecurity platform. The company’s rapidly growing customer base includes top brands such as ExpressVPN, Rapyd and T-Mobile, which have chosen to partner with Bugcrowd for one or more of its Bug Bounty, Penetration Testing and Vulnerability Disclosure Programs.

Serving nearly a thousand organizations worldwide, Bugcrowd empowers customers and hackers to unleash their ingenuity to protect brands and intellectual property. The company drove over 50% growth in payments to the hacker community through customer programs, amplifying a pivotal time of remarkable growth and innovation for the Bugcrowd Platform.

ExpressVPN, an industry-leading privacy and security company, chose Bugcrowd for its world-class team of hackers that had skills expertly matched to their unique scope. The company’s goal is to allow users to take control of their internet experience – with privacy and security at its core – and Bugcrowd makes this possible by streamlining the reporting, remediation, reward and disclosure processes of a public bug bounty program. ExpressVPN has been harnessing Bugcrowd’s powerful and highly-scalable Vulnerability Disclosure and Bug Bounty programs to protect their data and customers for over three years.

Bugcrowd’s latest customers include U.K.-based fintech company Rapyd, who chose Bugcrowd for its ability to support organizations around the globe in scaling their security programs to meet rapid organizational growth. During a time of major acquisitions and the need for more focused API testing, the 500+ Rapyd team transitioned to Bugcrowd in order to leverage the company’s highly specialized team of hackers that fit their exact needs. Bugcrowd’s CrowdMatch technology, which enables precise crowd matching, allows organizations to connect with the right hackers for Rapyd’s needs. In one year, the team found 40 total vulnerabilities, 15 of which were critical.

Top customers also include T-Mobile, the U.S.’ leader in 5G with the largest, fastest and most awarded 5G network in the country. T-Mobile and Bugcrowd launched a revamped public bug bounty platform to invite hackers to find vulnerabilities in T-Mobile’s applications and websites. T-Mobile evaluates the reported vulnerabilities and takes appropriate action.

Recorded 10 October, 2023.

#mysecuritytv #cybersecurity #pentesting #bugbounty #bugcrowd

In this interview, both John and Thian introduce the history of ISACs (formed in 1999, subsequent to the 1998 signing of U.S. Presidential Decision Directive-63), and in particular, the creation of OT-ISAC (Operational Technology Information Sharing and Analysis Centre) as one of the key trusts of the Cyber Security Agency of Singapore’s “OT Cybersecurity Masterplan 2019 to facilitate the sharing of information.

Reflecting on the journey from conceptualization to today, Thian Chin remarked that “OT-ISAC has become that safe harbour the platform for the organisations of the different parties with vested interest to different business lines come together to share, because their common goal is how do we then exchange information to reduce the risks that caused by threat actors.”

Other topics covered in the interview include:

• The types of information being shared – such as strategic threat landscape including cyber incidents and vulnerabilities, standards and best practices, and TTPs.

• Closing the cultural / communication gap between the engineers and the IT cybersecurity practitioners because “because the problem statement they're dealing with is the same. It's a threat actor out there to try to disrupt.”

• The maturing of conversations from beyond terminology such as zero trust, air gap to actual implementation

• What does success mean in information sharing - diversity of opinions – in particular, including C-suite in cybersecurity conversations, and more more stakeholders coming forward to share real-life case studies of actual incidences.

John Lee, Managing Director, Global Resilience Federation

John has more than 20 years of experiences in ICT and Information Security. He is currently the Managing Director of the Operational Technology Information Sharing Analysis Centre (OT-ISAC) that supports member organizations (public and private) in OT threat information. The centre was setup in 2019 and has members from Transport, Aviation, Maritime, Healthcare, Manufacturing, Water, Energy, Government etc. His past roles were in Information Security Governance, Risk Management, Security Operations, Infrastructure and Application Delivery. He has led teams in Asia-Pacific as well as managing global services. He is also a certified cybersecurity trainer for ISACA.

Thian Chin Lim Senior Director (Governance Group) GovTech

Thian Chin has over 20 years of experience in Information & Technology governance, risk management, resilience and compliance, and operational Technology cybersecurity.

Prior to his current appointment at GovTech, he led the Critical Information Infrastructure (CII) Division at the Cyber Security Agency of Singapore (CSA).

Before joining CSA in August 2015, he was responsible for the regional Technology Governance function in United Overseas Bank. He also led the Technology Risk function in GIC Pte Ltd from 2008 – 2013. In his earlier years, he was a manager leading a team of Information Technology auditors in Ernst & Young.

Thian Chin holds an Executive Masters in Cybersecurity from Brown University, Bachelor’s Degree in Computer Engineering from Nanyang Technological University and is an alumnus of the George C Marshall European Center for Security Studies. He is a certified CGEIT, CRISC, CISM, CISSP, CISA, CDPSE, GICSP and SABSA practitioner.

Recorded 7th Sept 2023, OT-ISAC Summit 2023, Voco Orchard, Singapore, 5pm.

Mr. Yigal Unna was appointed by Israel’s Prime Minister as the Director General of the Israel National Cyber Directorate (INCD) in 2018. In this 4 years role, until 2022, Mr. Unna reported directly to the Israeli Prime Minister and led a team of 350 employees responsible for all aspects of cyber security, including formulating policy and building technological power for operational defense of critical infrastructure. In addition to his work protecting Israel, Mr. Unna forged long-term relationships with many foreign governments and lectured around the world on cyber security.

Prior to the INCD, Mr. Unna served in the Israel Security Agency (ISA), also known as Shin Bet and Shabak, for 23 years. The ISA is Israel’s domestic intelligence service. He retired as the Director of the Cyber and Signal Intelligence Operations Division (military rank equivalent of major general).

Mr. Unna began his career as an officer in the elite Unit 8200 in the Israel Defense Forces. Unit 8200 is responsible for collecting signal intelligence and code decryption.

Overall, Mr. Unna served 33 years in Israel National security – all of them in cyber security and Data warfare.

Since retiring from public office, Mr. Unna advise to leading and promising Israeli cyber startups and growing enterprises, a venture partner in venture capital funds focusing on cyber security, and manage national cyber projects for foreign governments (Africa, Asia and eastern Europe).

Mr. Unna take part in the international advisory panel for Singapore Ministry of Transportation in Maritime, contributing his experience on cyber security aspects of Maritime.

Mr. Unna is part of the Global Cyber Group of Aspen institute, and a member of the advisory team to Krach Institute for tech diplomacy at Purdue, both US research institutions.

In this interview, Mr Unna shares with the audience his extensive experience, and his perspectives on the emerging cybersecurity issues introduced by innovations such as blockchain and AI.

Touching briefly on blockchain, Mr Unna notes that, the technology is a huge step “for managing our data and our knowledge in a better and more secure way” and will mature as we build more safeguards and applications.

As an example, he referred to the NFTs. He points out some of the lessons and possibilities introduced by the phenomenon, such as how to better secure and define assets in the future, including non-tangible assets.

On the topic of AI, Mr Unna also believes that, if history is any guide, that after the “first shock of fear and enthusiasm”, AI will be here to stay and “mankind will eventually build security and safeguards”.

However, he also points out that as with other new technologies, the AI innovation outpaces our abilities to put in appropriate safeguards. In particular, he cautions that for the first time in human history, “Intelligent and maybe even self aware machines may begin to become dangerous to mankind”.

He advises that technological companies put ethical principles before business outcomes, to fully harness the benefits of the AI while addressing the potential abuses.

Mr Unna also shares the three areas of AI that the Israel cybersecurity community is working and researching on:

(a) how cyber threat actors could exploit AI

(b) how cyber defenders could harness AI

(c) emerging threats from adversarial AI - a new playground of AI vs. AI

Wrapping up, Mr Unna shares 3 valuable cybersecurity lessons drawn from his extensive experience for defenders.

Recorded at ST Engineering’s InnoTech Conference 2023, held at Marina Bay Sands, Singapore on 5th September 2023, 4.30pm.

Our previous Webinar session with Mr Unna when in the role as Director General is available here

https://australiancybersecuritymagazine.com.au/australia-israel-counterpart-series-national-cybersecurity-strategy-insights/

Mark Orsi is the Chief Executive Officer of Global Resilience Federation, (GRF) a non-profit with the mission to develop and support threat intelligence and information sharing communities including education, operations technology, financial services, retail and hospitality, legal and professional services, energy, health, and oil and natural gas.

Launched in 2017 as a standalone company, from a former Financial Services Information Sharing and Analysis Center (FS-ISAC) division, GFR is the evolution of 1998's U.S. Presidential Decision Directive 63 and 2003's Homeland Security Presidential Directive 7 which mandated that the public and private sectors share information about cyber and physical security threats and vulnerabilities to help protect critical infrastructure.

Mr. Orsi led strategic efforts for several prominent Fortune 100 companies, working directly with CIOs and CISOs to develop, deploy, and improve security controls protecting the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of sensitive information.

Mark joined the company from JPMorgan Chase where he served as executive director and product owner for cybersecurity and technology controls. Prior to JPMorgan, Mr. Orsi served KPMG as director of cybersecurity, and Goldman Sachs as vice president of technology risk.

Mark holds an MBA from Columbia Business School, an MS in computer science from Johns Hopkins University, and a BS in Aerospace Engineering from the University of Maryland

In this interview, Mark shared the latest in artificial intelligence, and operational resiliency.

Artificial intelligence

Mark highlights how the latest AI innovations powered by large language model differ from the previous iterations of AI technologies such as democratising the cyberattacks tools used by nation state actors and leveraging dynamic datasets in training AI models.

He also notes how cyber defenders are adopting the technology to “multiply” the efforts of resources, for example, in code development and testing. He also foresees that such technology would empower cyber defenders to deliver more targeted threat intelligence.

Through a personal story, Mark illustrates how the technology lowers the barriers of entry for hacktivists and other threat actors, and the importance of exercising extra vigilance – including understanding how the third parties in the supply chain are using AI. He also notes that an “AI” SBOM (akin to the software SBOM) could help to address the AI model and data supply chain concerns.

Operational resiliency

Mark introduces the Operational Resilience Framework (ORF) launched by Global Resilience Federation’s Business Resilience Council (BRC) to solve the challenge of providing services in an impaired state.

For example, while businesses may have robust processes in place for backing up business or customer data for regulatory reasons, less attention may be paid to backup data such as system images or active directory, network configurations –which would minimize service disruptions in the face of destructive attacks and events.

He also explains that ORF was developed to be broadly applicable and is aligned with existing controls like those from NIST and ISO.

Some useful links and contacts:

• BRC: https://www.grf.org/brc
• Operational Resilience Framework: https://www.grf.org/orf
• Leadership Guide to AI Security - https://www.grf.org/the-leadership-guide-to-securing-ai
• Practitioners’ Guide to AI Security - https://www.grf.org/practitioners-guide-to-managing-ai-security
• General info: [email protected]; Mark Orsis: [email protected]
• Summit on Security and Third-Party Risk – Oct 11-12 Austin Texas: https://www.grf.org/2023-summit-on-security-and-third-party-risk

Recorded 25th August 2023, 1.30pm, GRF APAC Headquarters Singapore

Mike Silverman has a unique blend of a business and technology background, with 20 years of experience in strategic, technological, financial, and change management leadership across many industries, primarily in Financial Services and Software. He enables firms to innovate, scale, and transform through increasing productivity, reducing costs, and streamlining processes and operations.

Mr. Silverman was previously the Global Head of Enterprise Technology Strategy at FIS, the world’s largest Financial Technology Company. Prior to that, he was a management consultant focusing on Corporate & IT Strategy, CxO Advisory, Merger & Acquisition Integration, Business Process Re-engineering, and more, and has held other roles in innovation and development.

Mike has an MBA with specializations in Strategy, Finance, and Leadership & Change Management; and a BSE in Computer Engineering, Cum Laude with Departmental Honors.

In this interview, Mike shares with the audience highlights of the FS-ISAC (financial services information sharing and analysis centre) APAC Summit 2023 – in particular, on two themes: Artificial Intelligence and Quantum Technology.

Recorded 3rd August 2023, U.S. PST 6.am. SGT 9pm.

Jane Lo, Singapore Correspondent speaks with Miao Song, Global Chief Information Officer, GLP Singapore.

Miao Song has over 23 years of global experience in various industries, with broad exposure to the Oil/ Energy/Natural Resources as well as Consumer Goods and Health Care business. Over the course of her past tenure, she received many awards such as the CIO of the Year by IDG, Leadership Excellent, Women Leader, CIO of the Year Silicon Valley, Global CIO 100, and more.

In this interview, Miao shares the highlights of her presentation, “The emergence of GenAI technology”, at the World AI Show 2023.

She notes that latest AI innovation based on LLM (large language model) is significantly different from previous “traditional” AI or machine learning. In particular, the AI LLM models, enable the generation of new content with cognitive search and text summarisation.

Noting how the new capabilities could help drive efficiency or help humans “do jobs better” (for instance, in medical diagnosis), Miao stresses such benefits need to be balanced with concerns. Some of these considerations including the impacts on jobs, the need for regulation, and security risks implications.

For companies looking to adopt the latest AI innovation, Miao points out that it is “not a simple matter of having a conversation with ChatGPT and the problem will be solved”.

Rather, there is a need to understand the space and the technology (data structure and overall technology architecture), and the business pain points, to “translate the business opportunity into technology adoption”.

She elaborates that implementing AI is different from a traditional large IT project that typically runs linearly requiring a team of consultants.

Instead, the adoption requires hands-on approach to re-iterate “test and learn” cycles - in other words, education – which requires a secure environment to learn the capabilities and limitations of AI.

From her firm’s adoption journey, Miao offers a few tips:

• the technology team be immersed in the business to build practical use cases.

• the need for data architects and engineers to design data structures and identify the data types to be fed into AI

• security professionals to implement necessary measures to mitigate potential security breaches and AI specific risks (such as model risks that could lead to fraud)

• guidelines for the organisation (for examples, restricted use of confidential company information or personal information to experiment with AI; privacy regulations that are applicable)

Wrapping up, Miao offers the view that to remain competitive, companies will have to embrace and adopt the latest AI innovations. She also offers an optimistic view that with generative AI, we can move away from “memorising” knowledge to focus on generating creative ideas.

Recorded 2nd August 1.30pm, World AI Show 2023, Singapore Marina Bay Sands.

We speak with Asjad Athick, Cyber Security Lead, APAC for Elastic who gave a presentation at CISO Melbourne earlier this week. Asjad’s presentation encompassed the concepts around ‘unleashing the full potential of AI in security operations’.

In today's rapidly evolving threat landscape, security analysts play a crucial role in protecting organizations from cyberattacks. However, the overwhelming volume of security alerts and the complexity of identifying and responding to advanced threats pose significant challenges. Enter Artificial Intelligence (AI), the game-changer in security operations.

Asjad discusses the transformative potential of AI in Security Operations Centers (SOCs) and explores how it can empower security analysts to tackle the ever-growing complexities of cybersecurity. By harnessing the power of AI, SOC teams can enhance their capabilities, augment human expertise, and gain the upper hand against adversaries.

For further information visit https://www.elastic.co/security

#mysecuritytv #elastic #elasticsecurity #generativeai #aicybersecurity

Mr. Dean Gefen is a Director and Founder of Red Alpha Cybersecurity, and the CEO of DART Consulting and Training. Mr. Gefen is an Israeli cybersecurity expert, with more than 15 years of operational experience. He is highly proficient in cybersecurity training and consultancy, including in establishment of cybersecurity operational units, development of extensive training and qualification processes for governments, security organisations and the private sector.

Since 2017, Mr. Gefen has been advising and working with several governments in Asia, Europe and the Middle East, training hundreds of cybersecurity professionals annually.

In this interview, Dean shares his insights on up-skilling and re-skilling in cybersecurity.

He gives his perspectives of how cybersecurity skills are built on technical foundations, and the importance of the ability to understand how the adversary think and could compromise the network. He explains this means the need for cybersecurity professional to demonstrate the non-technical aptitude for the field – including ability to learn and think creatively.

He also introduces how Red Alpha’s “Alpha Specialist Training Programme (ASTP)” – a bootcamp and industry attachment cybersecurity training program - contributes to the overall capabilities and capability building in the industry.

Wrapping up, Dean also provides his views on lessons we can take from Israel - widely viewed to be one of the best in the world with a proven track record on training skilled cybersecurity professionals - to grow the talent pipeline.

To apply to the ASTP programme,

https://www.redalphacyber.com/programme-astp (for Singapore)

https://www.redalphacyber.com/programme-astp-us (for USA)

Recorded at Red Alpha Singapore, 17th July 2023, 10am.