Philippine Air Force taps PLDT, AIM to train top guns
to secure the country’s cyber assets
The Philippine Air Force (PAF) has tapped the country’s largest and only integrated telco PLDT, its wireless subsidiary Smart Communications, Inc. (Smart) and the Asian Institute of Management (AIM) to train its officers in handling cybersecurity threats.
Twenty PAF officers are joining the pilot run of the country’s first Online Cybersecurity Executive Course offered by AIM’s School of Executive Education and Lifelong Learning with PLDT’s Chief Information Security Officer Angel T. Redoble among its roster of cybersecurity experts and leading practitioners teaching the course.
“PLDT Inc. has fulfilled a vital role in helping the national government in protecting our nation’s cybersecurity domain. However, as we continue to improve, the same happens to the threats that surround us. It is in this note that the Command finds it imperative to create a pool of highly skilled Officers who will take the lead in protecting the Command from any form of adversary through strategic means,” said PAF Lt Gen Allen T Paredes in a letter to PLDT chair and CEO Manuel V. Pangilinan.
“The vulnerability to cyber-attacks is not unique to the Philippine cyberspace. Every country is also a target,” Redoble said.
“Over the years, the PLDT group has been investing in improving its cybersecurity capabilities to make sure we are able to combat cyber threats. Today’s ‘cyber warriors’ do not sleep, because their enemies are always awake,” Redoble added.
The Online Cybersecurity Executive Course tackles cybersecurity through three dimensions: leadership, management, and technology. It is designed for organizations and businesses with a presence in cyberspace, specifically for their (1) managers and leaders who deal with cybersecurity challenges at the operational level, and (2) C-Suites and executives who deal with strategic cybersecurity issues and policies.
The course will give participants an in-depth understanding of the importance of an organization-wide approach to cybersecurity, and enable them to understand, assess, and address the impact of cyber risk to develop strategies and policies to ensure their organizations’ cybersecurity.
The Online Cybersecurity Executive course will be delivered over ten (10) half-days via Zoom video conference by the Asian Institute of Management and PLDT-Smart in October 2020. The program is open to the public. Executives and managers should register for the course if they want to learn how to build cyber-resilient organizations from renowned.
This is part of the PLDT Group’s partnership with PAF to help improve its cybersecurity capabilities. Under the agreement, the PLDT Group, through its Cyber Security Operations Group (CSOG), will also enhance the military service’s cyber operations and upgrade the security of its digital infrastructure, in addition to training PAF’s “Cyber warriors”.
The partnership agreement also includes ePLDT’s Security Operation Center for PAF, which will provide PAF with their own dashboard to monitor their own cybersecurity operations, as well as a cyber intelligence platform to protect PAF’s infrastructure against cyber threats.
The AIM’s School of Executive Education and Lifelong Learning and PLDT-Smart’s strategic partnership to offer this Online Cybersecurity Executive Course was sealed via a virtual MOA signing ceremony last month, led by AIM President and Dean Dr Jikyeong Kang and PLDT chair Manuel V. Pangilinan.
“The partnership is timely to make organizations protect its technology-based innovations since, according to research, potential economic loss due to cybersecurity incidents in the Philippines can reach as much as US$3.5 billion. In addition to safeguarding organizations from monetary losses and securing systems and data from theft and damage, cybersecurity is important to keep customers and investors assured of their safety and privacy. I enjoin all organizations in the country to look at cybersecurity as an integral component of their growth and survival strategy,” Dr Kang said.
CYFIRMA offers view into SEA and Japan cyberthreat landscape
Threat report deep dives into cyber-attack campaigns against Southeast Asia and Japan organizations, as well as the motivation, methodologies and tools behind the attacks.
CYFIRMA, a predictive cyber-threat visibility and intelligence analytics platform company today released a Southeast Asia (SEA) and Japan Threat Landscape Report providing businesses and organizations in the region a predictive outlook of the cybersecurity challenges that they will likely face in the second half of 2020.
Kumar Ritesh, Founder and CEO at CYFIRMA, commented: “The SEA and Japan region presents a unique geography of developed and emerging markets. It is where some of the largest enterprises in the world are based, a hotbed for fast-growing start-up businesses that are driving technological innovations, as well as home to youthful populations who are digitally connected. At the same time, governments here are encouraging digital adoption and driving smart city projects.”
“All this connectivity translates to wider attack surfaces for threat actors. Additionally, cyber maturity may not be keeping pace with this growth, creating a ripe environment for cyberthreat actors looking to exploit vulnerabilities. We have already seen hacker groups taking advantage of the global health crisis over the last few months to intensify their attacks, causing a spike in cyberthreat activities.”
The SEA and Japan Threat Landscape Report offers facts and intelligence on reported cyber-attack campaigns with detailed information on the top attack methods. There is also section that deep dives into the top critical incidents in the first half of the year.
Additionally, the report focuses on specific threat actors that are targeting organizations in the region and offers an analytical view into the tools and attack methods, such as phishing, during the current pandemic.
“At CYFIRMA, we help organisations take a proactive and pre-emptive approach against cyberthreats by strengthening their tactical threat intelligence and constantly improving their cyber posture to stay ahead of adversaries. The report offers a landscape view on cyberthreat allowing organizations to better understand the motivation behind threat actors and the methods they adopt.”
The SEA and Japan Threat Landscape Report is developed by CYFIRMA researchers using its proprietary cloud-based threat discovery and cyber-intelligence platform DeCYFIR. The team taps on this to dive into hackers’ trenches to analyse and correlate information and discover the deepest insights from the data.
Converge ICT doubles international bandwidth
Converge ICT Solutions, Inc., the country’s premier pure end-to-end fiber internet service provider, further ensures continued improvement of online experience for the Filipinos through the implementation of its most recent wave of network upgrades. With the said network capacity augmentation, the fiber company’s own international bandwidth capacity to the key hubs of Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan and the US, has resulted in an average utilization of only 50 percent.
This ensures zero congestion of traffic for international internet users and more than enough capacity even in the event of submarine cable outage. This is consistent with our objective of having a high availability, low latency and non-blocking end-to-end network.
“We have doubled our international capacity to bring unparalleled connectivity experience for everyone,” shared Converge ICT Founder and Chief Executive Officer Dennis Anthony Uy. “With a total increased capacity, we aim to support connectivity needs at home and in business. Now, more than ever, the demand for a reliable network is of high importance. Especially with most facets of our lives being funneled online. Be it for virtual meetings, distance learning and cloud platforms, service delivery in the new normal needs commitment.”
“As consumer demands change, particularly due to their expectations for faster and reliable internet, the expanded and enhanced coverage of Converge ICT should enable our customers to do more with the better online service,” declared Uy. “This includes the workplace, educational institutions, and residential areas.”
On top of this, Converge ICT also added and expanded to 100Gbps its international uplinks to various internet exchanges, direct peering and internet transit, while also hosting Content Delivery Network (CDN) from the major over-the-top (OTT) providers. “With this, internet traffic is localized thereby allowing us to stay true to our commitment to provide the shortest path to any digital destination. We ensure the best possible experience for our subscribers when accessing whatever content they might require,” said Uy.
For more information, visit the Converge website at www.convergeict.com
