BICOM

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has called on governments worldwide to join forces to defend against cyber threats that he said could even bring down military and civilian aircraft.

Netanyahu addressed the annual international cyber security conference in Tel Aviv University yesterday and warned that governments “have unbelievable challenges and we must confront them. There will be no silver bullet. It doesn’t exist. There will be no solution that stops hermetically any country or even the majority of attacks”.

Referring to the new cyber centre in Beer Sheva, which includes the headquarters of the IDF’s elite 8200 signals unit, CERT Israel, Cyberspark and the university, Netanyahu told audience members that the new centre allows military, academic and business experts to work closely together.

He added: “This idea has profound benefits because minds fertilise each other when they meet. Still in the digital age meeting and talking has tremendous advantages.”

Israel’s cyber security industry was valued at $3.8bn in 2017 with $815m invested in the same period. There are now 50 international R&D centres based in Israel. Earlier this year, BICOM published a research paper about Britain – Israel cooperation in cyber security. BICOM CEO James Sorene described a “booming partnership at the official and commercial level. UK financial services want to ensure that their systems are safe and secure, so it is no surprise that they are increasingly working with Israeli cyber security companies who are the outstanding market leaders in fintech security”.