Uniken Security Innovation Summit 2014 raises concerns on information security

Key corporate decision-makers including Executive Directors and C-suite executives participated in the Uniken Security Innovation Summit, 2014, the maiden edition of the summit hosted by Uniken, a market leader in securing digital relationships, and Indian Software Product Industry Round Table (iSPIRT), a think-tank of next-generation software product companies.

The Summit brought together industry veterans and thought leaders to address the growing need for future-proof information security solutions and identify steps towards securing digital enterprises - today, tomorrow & beyond. The select gathering saw senior executives across industry verticals and defence attend, including CIOs/CTOs/CISOs, Heads of Information Security, Risk, Audit, Vigilance, Fraud Detection & Compliance Heads, Infrastructure and Technology.

Speaking at the event, Sanjay Deshpande, Co-Founder & CEO, Uniken said, “With the recent news of organised crime breaches, info-security clearly is no more a concern of just technology practitioners of an enterprise. The cyber-security solutions landscape is rapidly evolving and so are methods and techniques of cyber-crime. It is becoming increasingly clear that cyber-security and the corresponding risk mitigation strategies need to be intricately woven into strategic corporate decisions given the financial, reputational and legal impact on organizations. Hence, there is the need for more concerted and synergistic efforts at industry-level to overcome challenges and seek innovative & future proof solutions to the ever-evolving, rapidly growing concern of cyber-security.”

Speaking about the advancing landscape of cyber-threats, Tal Mozes, Leader of Hacktics Advanced Security Centre and Technology Advisor to Uniken said: “There are many mega trends – social media, Big Data, mobile & digital transformation – that are shaping the way enterprises and its stakeholders interact with each other. While each of these trends are business enablers, they each also pose various threats. On the other hand, digital crime is also becoming more organised, moving toward Advanced Persistent Threats. In a rapidly evolving scenario such as this, cyber-security can no longer be an isolated function but requires a focused effort and collaborative conversations among the various functions in an organisation, driven from the top.”

Advocating the need for a paradigm shift in dealing with cyber-security, Menny Barzilay, Former Head of IT Audit, Bank of Hapoalim and Technology Advisor to Uniken said: “Today, there is a shift in the way organisations are dealing with cyber-security, towards putting larger efforts into prevention rather than just reactively protecting interests. Organisations are beginning to recognise and acknowledge that many of the current systems, while offering security, do not safeguard and proactively prevent many of the emerging threats. There is a stated need for organisations to find innovative and efficient ways to combat cyber-security concerns.”

The Uniken Security Innovation Summit also spoke about the potential for Indo-Israel collaboration in the field of cyber-security, bringing together thought leaders from both nations in an effort to seek joint solutions and collaborative opportunities.

Sanjay Deshpande, who also champions the effort to bring together Indian and Israeli product companies together as a product circle member for iSPIRT, emphasized the need for the two nations to collaborate, stating, “Over the years Israel has fostered a spirit of innovation that has encouraged entrepreneurship. Israel is, today, recognized for having an advanced cyber-security market, with a robust ecosystem supporting it. We believe that there is much that we can learn from the entrepreneurs and experts in Israel to build and improve on India’s innovative product offerings. The Uniken Security Innovation Summit was a first step in taking forward this collaboration.”

Sameer Ratolikar, CISO, Axis Bank, and Arun Gupta, CIO, CIPLA participated in an interactive session to address challenges in cyber-security for Indian organisations, the evolving roles of the CIO and emergence of the Chief Information Security Officer. The Summit recognized that recent instances of data-breaches and info-security lapses have had a far-reaching impact on an organization on various fronts: financial, legal and reputational. In order to address the legal aspects of information-security and cyber-threats, Mr. Prashant Mali, Cyber Law Attorney also participated in the Summit.