Outgoing national cyber chief: 150 monthly attacks on Israeli companies

Carmeli indicated that there were around five instances each month where the cyber penetration was major enough and important enough to the country to have been reported to the prime minister.

By YONAH JEREMY BOB
Updated: JUNE 29, 2018 04:42
Cyber hacking (illustrative) (photo credit: INGIMAGE)
Cyber hacking (illustrative)
(photo credit: INGIMAGE)
Outgoing National Cyber Security Authority director Buky Carmeli said on Thursday that Israeli companies have been experiencing an average of 150 cyber penetrations per month.
Speaking at a conference in Mitzpe Ramon on anti-drone and cyber issues organized by Avnon Group’s Skylock Division, Carmeli said, “This is only the number that we know. My guess is the numbers are even higher.”
Further, Carmeli indicated that there were around five instances each month where the cyber penetration was major enough and important enough to the country to have been personally reported to the prime minister.
All of this was despite a stateof- the-art cyberdefense and coordination structure that Carmeli presented to diplomats and businesspeople from a wide range of countries.
The outgoing cyber chief gave examples where his directorate quickly informed the entire Israeli market about exactly what cyber issues they needed to fix within only 24 hours of massive cyber attacks in wide-ranging countries, from Bangladesh to Vietnam.
He contrasted the NCSA’s speed – which is continually providing cyber solutions at a pace of three weeks for designing them – to the Defense Ministry’s model of developing new systems after years of investment.
Drawing attention to the NCSA’s 24/7 emergency call center and response team, he said that it took a NIS 200 million investment and was not something that the private sector would have ever accomplished because of the lack of generating any concrete profit, even as it is a critical function.
He talked about the complexity of answering calls from the prime minister at 2 a.m.
and having to give an early and condensed answer about the state of the country after a cyberattack when much of the facts were still unknown and developing.
Carmeli noted that he had ironed out lines of authority and different roles for the many government and intelligence agencies involved in cyber issues.
Finally, he emphasized his investment in building a 200-person workforce from almost scratch in a market where it is hard to attract top minds away from the private sector.