SpotlightFebruary2018

By Jamie Barrie T he Federal Liberals are set to table Canada’s 2018 budget next week and it is expected that it will included major government dollars being investment in building up Canada’s National Cyber Security Defences along with encouraging tech firms and talented program- mers to work with the federal government on this process. The Liberal’s are not expected to release details of the new strategy itself in the budget as that will come later in the year by Public Safety Canada. Although exact details have yet to be released on which departments will get funding and howmuch of the expected $1 billion CAD in Federal spending they will receive. It’s expected that the majority of funding will go to update the National Cyber Security Strategy, that was first introduced by the former Conservative government back in 2010. Area that we would expect to see new or increased funding would be; Elections Canada to safeguard against foreign interfer- ence in upcoming federal elections. This has been a major concern since the 2016 U.S. Presidential election, which the American intelligence officials say were influenced by Russian hackers which have been the focus of many ongoing investigations. Communications Security Establishment, the arm of National Defence which collects signals intelligence and helps protect federal computer networks. Developing and Training Funding for the next generation of Canadian cyber-professionals and incentives to get them in Canada. Funding for co-development project that would allow gov- ernment institutions and agencies to work with Canadian companies to come up with Canadian made cybersecuri- ty solutions rather than purchasing software and hardware products and services elsewhere. This type of investing and budget spending show that the federal government is concerned and committed about the “sovereign protection” of data which has become a valuable commodity in today’s world.

71

FEBRUARY 2018 • SPOTLIGHT ON BUSINESS MAGAZINE

Made with FlippingBook Annual report