Symantec’s Pre-budget Commentary – Malaysia National Budget 2009

Suzie Tan, Managing Director, Malaysia, Symantec Corporation:

Malaysia is set to experience increasing online activities as the government and industry continues to expand broadband proliferation in the country. While connectivity is synonymous to bolstering productivity and fostering innovation thus enriching the knowledge-based society, it also introduces a host of malicious threats involving scam and financial fraud.

In view of this, Symantec recommends emphasizing on cyber security as one of the elements in building a holistic public safety and security net. These threats, once primarily restricted to the physical world, are now posing heightened risks to governments, businesses and consumers as more attackers are targeting private and sensitive information for financial gain. While physical measures are important, the urgency of tackling security in the cyberspace cannot be underestimated. Symantec recommends for the government to review and strengthen Malaysia’s cyber security legislations and regulations, which include the Computer Crimes Act 1997, Communications and Multimedia Act 1998 and Digital Signatures Act 1998. These regulations should cover more practicable set of steps or principles that organizations or individuals should implement in order to reasonably meet minimum levels of security.

Closer collaborations with the private sector and international agencies can be established to develop sound cyber security policies and plans. Capitalizing on such collaboration, the government should institutionalize a national critical infrastructure protection (CIP) legislative framework, led by a designated authority empowered with the necessary tools to drive the organization’s functions and agenda.

Such relationships can also be used to improve collective intelligence of the security landscape, enabled through effective and efficient monitoring, reporting and information exchange concerning impending threats, ongoing attacks and actionable mitigation measures. With a strong early warning system in place, impending threats can be effectively mitigated and neutralized at an early stage.

Symantec has been engaging with governments across the globe to strengthen policy environment, secure the infrastructure and raise public awareness on cyber security issues. Locally, Symantec is providing inputs on security threats into the global response center of Malaysia-initiated International Multilateral Partnership Against Cyber-Terrorism (IMPACT).

IMPACT is an example of positive effort to stimulate collaboration from governments and private organizations across the world to enhance the global capability to prevent, defend and respond to cyber threats.

Moving forward, Symantec is committed to working closely with the Malaysian government to drive legislation enhancements, as well as sharing its global intelligence and expertise, all in all to ensure that the governments, businesses and consumers can maximize the potential of a secure and confident connected environment.

Symantec also believes that the budget measures should continue encouraging SMBs to leverage on ICT to allow them to compete in the global market. Given the sector’s potential to spearhead economic growth, SMBs need to be empowered with technology that optimizes their business environment through efficient data management. Ongoing education and awareness programs are essential to help SMBs realize not only the value of technology, but also smarter ways of investing in securing, managing and recovering information effectively.

Symantec is encouraged that the Malaysian government has been driving numerous programs to propel greater adoption of technology among SMBs across industries. Significantly, the adoption of leading-edge ICT solutions by SMBs will help to ensure the long-term competitiveness of Malaysia in the global economy.