Securing Canada’s Digital Future Requires Federal Action Now

This content was provided by Cyber. Right. Now. campaign member Beauceron Security Inc..

Canada faces a dire digital future unless changes are made today by the federal government to improve insight into cybersecurity attacks, set basic national cybersecurity hygiene standards, and provide more resources for the most targeted organizations.

That’s the message Beauceron CEO David Shipley delivered last week to the House of Commons Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security.

Shipley was joined as an expert witness to the committee by Dr. Ken Barker, Professor at the Institute for Security, Privacy and Information Insurance at the University of Calgary and Juliette Kayyem, a Belfer Lecturer on International Security for the Harvard Kennedy School of Government.

The Standing Committee was tasked by parliament with exploring national cybersecurity and safety issues in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Beauceron Security is the only major Canadian controlled cybersecurity firm specializing in the human side of cybersecurity. Our software-as-a-service (SaaS) platform serves nearly 600 customers ranging from North America’s biggest banks to national telecommunications firms, governments, higher education, healthcare, SMB and more. Beauceron Security’s technology is used to educate and motivate more than half a million people to know more and care more about their role in cybersecurity.

Shipley appears regularly in media and at public and private events to talk about cybersecurity news and policy issues. He is also the Co-chair for the Canadian Chamber of Commerce’s national cyber campaign Cyber Right Now.

His recommendations to the Standing Committee focused on mandatory incident reporting following a cyberattack, enforcing cyber hygiene at a national level, providing greater security funding to vulnerable sectors such as healthcare, municipalities and higher education, and that cybersecurity needs to be dealt with at a national level.

Shipley emphasized that unless immediate action from the Canadian Government is taken, Canada’s cyber future is not a bright one.

“Failure to act today damns us to a future where our businesses are crippled from waves of foreign extortion attempts, our citizens and politics are poisoned with division and disinformation and our ability to provide the essentials of life, from heat, lights, water, to food production and distribution, are vulnerable to the whims of nation-states like Russia or even small groups of individuals who want to see us fail as a democracy and as a society.”

The federal government appears to be receptive to Shipley’s recommendations. Minister of Public Safety, Marco Mendicino, said following the Standing Committee that the government is open to a broader mandatory reporting regime.

To listen to the full standing committee discussion: https://parlvu.parl.gc.ca/Harmony/en/PowerBrowser/PowerBrowserV2/20220607/-1/37249