{"id":12933,"date":"2016-09-12T11:11:18","date_gmt":"2016-09-12T15:11:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.kaspersky.com.au\/blog\/?p=12933"},"modified":"2019-11-15T22:49:37","modified_gmt":"2019-11-15T11:49:37","slug":"dublin-forum-2016","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.kaspersky.com.au\/blog\/dublin-forum-2016\/12933\/","title":{"rendered":"Futureproofing cybersecurity"},"content":{"rendered":"

The cybersecurity industry has a fundamental insecurity: talent supply. Frost & Sullivan estimates<\/a> that by the year 2020 the field of cybersecurity will see a talent shortage of 1.5 million skilled employees despite the effort of education systems around the world to increase capacity.<\/p>\n

The IT departments of large companies will bear much of the brunt of the shortage. However, the real fight will happen between specialized security vendors searching and competing for experts with cross-domain knowledge. You don\u2019t find people like that in your average university.<\/p>\n

The challenge of talent shortfall was discussed at a panel held by Kaspersky Lab in Dublin, Ireland. Widely known as the Silicon Valley of Europe, Ireland \u2014 and Dublin in particular \u2014 is very active in training and hiring IT professionals, making the city a natural choice of venue for a discussion involving a huge group of interested parties: security vendors, educational institutions, recruitment agencies, and government representatives.<\/p>\n

All panelists shared the view that although education systems are already actively adapting to address the issue, it\u2019s not enough to overcome the expected shortage. Shane Nolan, CEO of IDA Ireland explained: \u201cThe capacity to train new people at the academic level stepped up a number of notches during the past five years. Pretty much every college in the country has an undergrad or postgrad course in cybersecurity\u2026. I think promoting this capacity to kids is vitally important. And the work placement part of the education system is vitally important. Many students choose generic IT education. If we could divert this traffic towards cybersecurity applications, that would go somewhere as well.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Futureproofing<\/p>\n

Jacky Fox, risk advisory director for Deloitte Ireland and leader of Deloitte\u2019s Cyber Security and IT Forensic service in the country, added that ideally, at least one lesson in cybersecurity should be provided to every student regardless of his or her field of study. \u201cIt may turn some heads. It may be a potential option for them,\u201d she concluded.<\/p>\n

Dr. Michael Schukat, a lecturer in the Department of Information Technology at the National University of Ireland, Galway, emphasized that the problem should be addressed in earlier stages as well, during the school years: \u201cTeenagers are interested in programming, but they end up doing mechanical engineering or civil engineering because that\u2019s the advice they got. Where we can step in? I suppose we have a right person sitting here [points at Eugene Kaspersky<\/em>]: We need role models, we need rock stars of cybersecurity being more visible, showing those teenagers (and their parents) there\u2019s a career, there\u2019s money, there\u2019s a lot of excitement in cybersecurity. And also, we need to enhance our efforts to get students interested in cybersecurity \u2014 right now ICT is just programming. We can spin it off to make it focus on cyber, we could have hackathons, open days, you name it. Eventually we will find students gravitating to cybersecurity.\u201d<\/p>\n

Eugene Kaspersky himself thinks that it\u2019s not that difficult to get students interested: \u201cFirst, IT security is now everywhere from a phone to a turbine,\u201d he said. \u201cSecond, in many cases we have to investigate, to hunt the men. Third, there\u2019s more demand for cybersecurity experts, so they\u2019re better and better paid.\u201d<\/p>\n

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#Ireland<\/a> is officially RnDland \u2013 @e_kaspersky<\/a> #Dublin<\/a> #Infosec<\/a> pic.twitter.com\/hjkQTQ065o<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Kaspersky (@kaspersky) September 7, 2016<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n