(Expansion) – Over the last decade, unemployment has been a constant in the world which, as expected, was aggravated by the COVID-19 pandemic. And although 2022 has meant a year of recovery, there are still six million more unemployed young people than before the health crisis, according to the International Labor Organization.
But not everything is the lack of opportunities, it has also impacted the lack of capacity development in some areas, such as Information Technology (IT).
And it is that digital acceleration, in addition to bringing great benefits, has also imposed technological challenges that have opened parallel gaps between the number and sophistication of cyberattacks and the needs to develop skills in cybersecurity. All this for the containment and mitigation of incidents within organizations, regardless of the sector to which they belong.
In fact, Microsoft predicts that by 2025, there will be 3.5 million open cybersecurity jobs worldwide. Currently, in Latin America alone there is a lack of 701,000 professionals in this field, according to the 2021 Cyber Workforce Report of (ISC) 2 .
Regarding Mexico, in particular, Microsoft currently estimates a deficit of more than 260,000 professionals in this field. This could be a driver of one of the legislative initiatives on cybersecurity that raises the possibility of creating the University of Information Technologies, Communications and Innovation.
However, it is important to appreciate that the defense of the digital environment goes beyond a degree or engineering; The development of multiple skills and a consultative approach are required, not only to diagnose a cyber attack, but also to include a containment strategy and the development of effective defense capabilities, as well as cyber resilience.
According to the report, the State of Cyber Resilience 2022, published by the insurance broker Marsh, we have made little or no progress from 2019 to date regarding the confidence of various executives of leading organizations in sectors such as cybersecurity, IT, management risk and insurance, finance and executive leadership.
Even mistrust grew, since, in 2019, 20% had high confidence in their cyberattack mitigation or prevention capabilities, while today this number has dropped to 12%, that is, 88% do not believe they are capable of defending your organization in the face of growing cybersecurity threats.
With this scenario, we are not surprised by the high rates of cyberattacks. According to Fortinet from January to June 2022, the Latin American and Caribbean region suffered 137 billion attempted cyberattacks, an increase of 50% compared to the same period last year (with 91 billion). Mexico was the most attacked country in the region (with 85 billion), followed by Brazil (with 31.5 billion) and Colombia (with 6.3 billion).
To the shortage of professionals in the field must be added the persistent lack of interest in the industry in safeguarding its critical infrastructure; the little or minimal participation of senior managers and collaborators from different areas in the creation and management of computer security policies and procedures; as well as the expansionism of disinformation in social networks and web media.
This trend makes legislative, operational and organizational discussion imperative in order to promote options to counter the needs of computer security. For now, one option could be to use regulations, standards, certifications or organizations specialized in cybersecurity, which end up being the ideal allies to face the ever-increasing challenges with the availability of trained professionals and effective detection, containment and prevention strategies. cyber resilience.
Editor’s Note : Manuel Alexandro Moreno Liy is Director of Security Sales Enablement at IQSEC. Follow him on . The opinions published in this column correspond exclusively to the author.
