The Irish government has published its National Cyber Security Strategy​, it is an update of the country’s first Strategy which was published in 2015.

The 2019 National Cyber Security Strategy aims to allow Ireland to continue to safely enjoy the benefits of the digital revolution and play a full part in shaping the future of the Internet.

The report warns the national economy and the confidence in the State would be undermined by a major cyber attack on one of the numerous data centers that multinational tech giants have built around the country.

The new National Cyber Security Strategy urges reform to protect critical infrastructure from major cyber threats, it also warns of possible interference in Irish elections by foreign states.

“Ireland is home, according to some estimates, to over 30 per cent of all EU data, and to the European headquarters of many of the world’s technology companies.” reads the Strategy. “Our economic success is therefore closely bound up with our ability to provide a secure environment for these companies to operate here,” the paper warns.

“An outage or incident affecting one of those facilities could have immediate disruptive effects on infrastructure or business across the EU or globally. In turn, this means that the infrastructure supporting these centres , public and private, now has an elevated security and economic risk associated with it,”.

Ireland infrastructures suffered a “number of serious cyber security incidents” in recent years that demonstrate the urgency to improve the national cyber defen s es .

“The document flags “fundamental challenges” in securing classified information in some Government departments and agencies, which extends to sensitive information obtained from other states and international bodies.” reported The IrishTimes .

The growth of the Irish economy in the next years depends also on its capability to offer secure infrastructure to the tech firms that have chosen the country to establish their data centers.

“The security of every process, service and piece of infrastructure in Ireland, from the electoral process through to military infrastructure and the security of public sector data has to be approached in a different way, because they are all, to some extent, dependent on connected devices and can now be targeted directly from anywhere on the planet,” the report warns.

The concept of “critical infrastructure” has changed since the first publishing of the strategy, now new essential services have been identified, like election processes and systems, and it is necessary to address the cyber threats that could impact them.

The Strategy call for legislative provisions in terms of the security measures that critical infrastructure and operators of essential services must implement.

Pierluigi Paganini