SINGAPORE: Singapore is ramping up its supply of cyber-security experts through a training programme that will be conducted in Israel.
RSA, the security division of American IT solutions company EMC, announced on Wednesday that it will be working with the Economic Development Board (EDB) on a multi-year agreement to train some 2,500 Singaporeans in cyber-security over the next five years.
The move is to address the global shortage of qualified cyber security professionals needed to defend critical IT infrastructures in civilian and government organisations.
According to Interpol statistics, 14 people fall prey to cyber crime every second.
In his opening speech for the RSA Asia Pacific conference, Senior Minister of State for Home Affairs and Foreign Affairs Masagos Zulkifli said: “Already, cyber-criminals are targeting the smaller companies as larger corporations up their ante against cyber-crime. They gain access to the large corporations when these smaller companies merge or get acquired. It is thus critical to invest in, or provide capacity-building and training programmes for our counterparts to improve our overall resilience against cyber-threats on a global scale.”
Qualified graduates from Singapore universities and existing cyber-security professionals can apply for the multi-year residency and repatriation programme designed to equip them with the relevant skills needed for cyber-security and anti-fraud careers.
The programme will be complemented by a new training course administered by the EDB, in cooperation with RSA, to bring certified candidates to RSA’s world-class cyber security and RSA Anti-Fraud Command Center (AFCC) located outside Tel Aviv, Israel.
The training initiative is part of EDB’s Strategic Attachment and Training (STRAT) Programme, which aims to build up Singapore’s manpower capabilities in strategic areas and sectors through overseas training and attachment with leading companies.
Director of Safety and Security Industry Programme Office (SSIPO) at EDB Gian Yi-Hsen said: “The SSIPO is focused on developing and strengthening the local and global talent pool to meet the global demand for cyber security professionals.
“The collaboration with RSA would lead to the creation of good jobs for Singaporeans and creates a readily available talent pool for companies to tap when they set up operations in Singapore.”
Candidates can take part in either a one-year or two-year training rotational programme to gain advanced skills required to fight cyber crime and advanced cyber threats in areas such as phishing, pharming and Trojan attack detection, analysis and shutdown; e-commerce and online banking fraud; security management and monitoring; breach preparedness and incident response; and governance, risk and compliance.
Chairman of RSA Arthur Coviello said: “They will actually see fraudsters in action. We monitor their chatrooms and performances. They will learn lots of information about how Trojans morph and change, attack methodologies, different threat actors…. they will also learn a lot about security operations and how to defend against these very attackers so the best way to develop skills to defend is to know how they come at you offensively.”
The candidates will be selected graduates from Singapore universities and existing cyber-security professionals.
At the end of the course, they will return to Singapore to take on a spectrum of roles in the IT industry, which could be related to anti-fraud analysis and software development.
Mr Coviello said: “One of the issues that we face today with young engineers and software programmers coming out of school is they know lots about programming but precious little about security and attacks, and having that kind of knowledge and then combining it with the ability to develop software is a heck of a skill to have.”
Mr Corviello said the collaboration with EDB is a win-win partnership as it also allows the RSA to expand its presence in the Asia Pacific region.
He said: “We think it is an attractive opportunity to work with talented upcoming professionals from Singapore and train them for a couple of years in our anti-fraud techniques for the purpose of hiring them and building our anti-fraud command centre here in Singapore.
“It is a mutually beneficially relationship because we have more and more Singaporeans who will learn these techniques. And even if we don’t hire them, they will come back and be available to be hired in other businesses. But I can assure you, we will take maximum advantage of them as they go through their rotations.
RSA will open the application process for the cyber security residency programme in the third quarter of this year.
Singapore to boost pool of cyber-security experts over next 5 years
No comments:
Post a Comment