The Diplomat in Spain

Secretary of State for Security, Francisco Martínez, and Commander in Chief of the Defense, admiral Fernando García, yesterday in Toledo. / Photo: Diego de la Vega/APE 

Alberto Rubio. Toledo.

Cyber-attacks generate annual losses of 300,000 million euros for the world economy, according to information provided by the Secretary of State for Security, Francisco Martínez, during the seminar “Cyber-threats and answers”, organised by the Association of European Journalists, which ends today in Toledo.  

The Internet and cyberspace have become over the last few years the new, and lucrative, battlefield of the 21^st century. Cybernetic espionage has increased exponentially and, according to information from the British Government, it has caused annual losses of 27,000 million pounds to that country’s companies.

The theft of intellectual property is centred especially on the energy, financial, chemistry and communications sectors, but it also affects mining, pharmaceutical companies and engineering, though the latter are not considered “critical” sectors in terms of national security.

Suleyman Anil, a member of NATO’s Cyber-defence centre, provided an important fact yesterday which helps understand the complexity and extension of the Cyber-threats faced by States and businesses: “anyone with 40 or 50 million can launch a Cyber-attack like these”.

[hr style=”single”]

NATO is working on a new definition of its Article 5, to give a common answer to cybernetic threats

[hr style=”single”]

With this “modest” investment, if we compare it to the losses generated, programs likes Energetic Bear, launched from Russia, collapse the systems of many companies or steal projects. In Spain, this type of attack hurts more the big companies (497,000 average yearly losses) than the small or medium sized ones (38,000)

Cyber-crime currently moves more money than drug trafficking, according to Francisco Martínez. The solution is in “trying to know the aggressor”, states Javier Candau, head of the Security Area of the National Cryptology Centre (Spain). NATO is already working on a new definition of its Article 5, to give a common answer to cybernetic threats.