Experts call for more cybersecurity professionals in PH

CEBU CITY – Claiming more companies are experiencing cyberattacks, an official of USAID and a cybersecurity expert have called for more cybersecurity professionals to help the government contain threats of cyberattacks.

John Avila, senior economic growth specialist of United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Office of Economic Development and Governance, and Carlos Ely Tingson, a former military officer and now cybersecurity expert, both believed that have more cybersecurity professionals will put the country in good hands.

Tingson, senior vice president at Kroll Inc., a US cybersecurity firm based in Manila, said the demand for cybersecurity professionals is notably rising in the country.

Avila noted that number of hackers are rising with more firms under threat of cyberattacks.

“Hackers’ numbers are rising and Philippine firms are easy prey due to lack of cybersecurity professionals,” Avila said in the vernacular during the 15th Media Seminar organized by the US Embassy on June 6 in Cebu City. 

It was dubbed as “Building Blocks: The US-Philippine Partnership for a Prosperous and a Cyber-secure Digital Economy” participated by about 30 journalists from across the Philippines.

Tingzon said cybersecurity professional take home pay is irresistible but refuse to provide specific amount one gets a month.  “Basta malaki, more than six or seven digits,” he reluctantly responded when asked how much.

Both also called on the country’s academe to institutionalize cybersecurity profession to counter cyberattacks and save millions of pesos. 

Tingzon said not all hackers are bad. In the industry, there white hat hackers who are called ethical security hackers who identify and fix vulnerabilities. They hack into the systems with the greenlight from organizations they hack into, find weaknesses and fix them.

He said there are also hackers employed by companies to get into the system of a competitor and steal valuable data.

US Ambassador to the Philippines Mary Kay Carlson, in a recorded audio message to the seminar participants, that the pandemic highlighted and accelerated many trends, including the new digital economy.

“E-commerce and digitalization have made our lives easier in many ways,” she said, adding that at the same time, the trend toward digitalization has brought on an increase in cybersecurity threats.  

“Cyberattacks are not just restricted to attacks against government or institutions. Unfortunately, businesses – regardless of size – have been subjected to cyberattack,” Carlson said.

Carlson said cyberattacks is particularly worrisome since majority of companies in the Philippines are small and medium enterprise. Mostly do not have the level of digital protection that a large company may possess.

“The Philippines aspires to become a regional leader in the digital economy. IN this context, the need to protect the economy through cybersecurity is even more important,” the American envoy said.

Stressing cyberattacks transcend borders and boundaries, Carlson said the US digital ecosystem is intertwined with that of the Philippines “because we are friends, partners and allies and our economies are connected in so many ways.”

The US is the Philippines largest export market, Carlson said, and American companies are also among Philippines’ largest investors, private employers and taxpayers.

Participants to the seminar visited Concentrix in Cebu, an American firm that is the country’s largest private employer with mover 120,000 Filipino employees. Carlson said “the daily work of Concentrix depends upon the strength of our cyber networks.”

She said the importance of cybersecurity for the firms like Concentrix is just one example of how national security is economic security, to paraphrase Pres. Marcos statement. “And economic security is national security.”