Rome 18 March 2016 16:00
- The conference "Cyber-defence systems for SMEs" - organised by CESTUDIS jointly with Finmeccanica - focuses on strategies to protect SMEs from computer threats
- According to industry analyses, these enterprises are hackers' favourite target: 71% of all data breaches are against companies with less than 100 employees
- Only systematic cooperation with major industry and institutions is able to assure adequate protection to these companies
- Finmeccanica provides cyber-protection services to more than 1500 small and medium-sized companies
The analysis of cyber vulnerabilities experienced by Italian small and medium-sized companies was the focus of the conference "Cyber defence systems for SMEs”. Organised by the CESTUDIS Defence and Security Research Centre, chaired by gen. Luigi Ramponi, in cooperation with Finmeccanica, the conference was attended by representatives of institutions and the private sector.
According to industry analyses, in fact, small and medium-sized enterprises are hackers' favourite target: 71% of all data breaches - mainly aiming at fraudulent acquisition of knowledge and intellectual property - are against companies with less than 100 employees. This is a significant portion of the national economic system, both in terms of their large number - they represent over 90% of Italy's industrial sector - and of their substantial accumulated expertise. An asset that must be adequately protected from possible cyber-threats.
Fragmentation, small size and limited individual financial resources of these concerns results in the need to develop an effective cyber-defence and protection system, coordinated by those external entities that - thanks to their technological and financial resources - have already been able to organise themselves to deal with risks from the internet.
That is the starting assumption of the presentation by Andrea Biraghi, head of Finmeccanica's Security and Information Systems Division, who has identified cyber-espionage as a new and real threat for Italian small and medium-sized enterprises and puts forth a collaborative approach between them, major industry and institutions, to assure state-of-the-art protection models and consequently, maintain an adequate level of competitiveness for these concerns and for the country as a whole, with controlled costs and investments.
Finmeccanica in Cyber Security
With dedicated infrastructures in Italy and in the United Kingdom, Finmeccanica is the technological partner of governmental institutions and commercial and financial organisations in cyber security activities for prevention, monitoring and management. It also belongs to a number of national and international institutions and networks active in the sector.
Key experience has been gained by Finmeccanica in the NATO programme Computer Incident Response - Full Operational Capability (NCIRC - FOC), which assures the security of information and ICT infrastructure from cyber-attacks in 52 NATO sites in 29 different countries. Operative since May 2014, the programme is continuously expanding and represents the largest initiative in this field that has ever been implemented outside the United States.
Furthermore, the UK Ministry of Defence has recently selected Finmeccanica for the protection of its networks from computer attacks and incidents.