Israel ramps up cyber defense with new national body

[InfoSec News <alerts () infosecnews org>]

http://www.timesofisrael.com/israel-ramps-up-cyber-defense-with-new-national-body/

By David Shamah
The Times of Israel
September 21, 2014

Israel is stepping up its cyber-defense efforts. The government on Sunday 
announced establishment of a new cyber-defense authority to coordinate 
cyber-security efforts among government, industry, and the civilian 
sectors. Just last year, it set up the National Cyber Bureau and the two 
steps show that the nation is taking cyber threats seriously, now that 
it’s a favorite target for politically motivated hackers

Heading the new effort will be the National Cyber Bureau head, Dr. Eviatar 
Matania, who will be given “the authority to defend the civilian sphere 
from cyber threats and will constitute an operative agency that will act 
alongside the National Cyber Bureau, which will continue to build and 
maintain the State of Israel’s national strength as an international 
leader in the field,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said in a 
statement.

Experts say Israel is the target of almost daily attacks, especially 
denial of service (DDOS), in which hackers try to flood a site with 
messages to paralyze it. Israeli cyber-security arms have been so 
effective in blocking the attacks that most never even cross the threshold 
of public awareness. Such attacks multiplied during the summer war against 
Hamas terrorists in Gaza, but none caused significant damage.

The announcement of the new body comes just a week after a major 
international event on cyber-security, sponsored by Tel Aviv University’s 
Cyber Research Center (ICRC). Dozens of cyber-security officials and 
experts gathered to discuss the latest on-line threats and how to defend 
against them.

[...]

--
Evident.io - Continuous Cloud Security for AWS.
Identify and mitigate risks in 5 minutes or less.
Sign up for a free trial @ https://evident.io/