Toespraak minister Van der Steur bij de Global Conference on CyberSpace

Toespraak | 16-04-2015

Ladies and gentlemen,

I too would like to welcome you here today. Also on behalf of state secretary Klaas Dijkhoff, who unfortunately could not make it today. I apologize on his behalf. Of course, it is a great honour for me to present the Global Forum on Cyber Expertise.

One of the first computers in the Netherlands, was owned by my grandfather. He worked as an actuary. He used it to calculate pension payments. Of course, this computer was at his office. In the garden of his office, to be more precise... In a building, specially designed so it could fit the machine.

It reminds me of the progress we have made over the years.

Every generation has made its own contribution to this development.

Scientists like Alan Turing and John von Neumann, who in the mid-twentieth century were already thinking about how a modern computer could work.

Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs, who brought computers into our homes in the 1970s and 1980s.

And Tim Berners-Lee and Robert Cailliau, the founding fathers of the World Wide Web.

The internet is their wonderful legacy to us, but it is also a serious responsibility.

Cyber attackers can disrupt our digital infrastructure. And anyone who threatens a country’s digital infrastructure is a threat to social order.

In this day and age, those who try to make a distinction between security offline and security online are fooling themselves – and running the risk of failing on both counts.

So we must ask yourselves: How do we ensure that the internet is safe, free and an instrument for prosperity?

To answer this question, we must work together. And we need to work together at every level.

Business, government, civil society, the academic world and the tech community: we are all responsible to protect the digital infrastructure of our lives.

Ladies and gentlemen,

I am proud to say that with the Global Forum on Cyber Expertise, we now have a custom-built platform for this cooperation.

Tomorrow sees the end of the GCCS. But, as Winston Churchill once said: This is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.

I say this, because tomorrow marks the start of our joint GFCE.

This means that we can carry on with our work. By sharing our experiences and expertise. And by working hard to build innovative concepts in the field of cyber data protection, e-governance and cybersecurity. This will lead to a fundamentally safer internet.

Later you will be given more information about each of the concrete initiatives, that have gained a place in this forum.

For now, I want to highlight three examples. They are CERT maturity, awareness and responsible disclosure.

By its nature, the internet is without borders.

A credit card company in the United States can come under attack from a group of criminals in Africa.

A Dutch database can be attacked by hackers from Poland, or any other country.

To cope with threats like these, we need to help each other. That means that our Computer Emergency Response Teams must be in a state of readiness to defuse them.

But simply having a CERT in place is not enough. We need to work towards CERT maturity. And ensure that as many countries as possible have the policy, legislation and capacity to meet international needs. To achieve this, an initiative will be launched within the GFCE.

And it is great to see that a number of organisations are contributing: the International Telecommunication Union, the Organization of American States (OAS), Microsoft, and the European Union Agency for Network and Information Security.

Ladies and gentlemen,

To strengthen our resilience, we need everyone’s help. And that’s why awareness is on the agenda of the GFCE.

People from all walks of life are connected to the internet – and to each other. As we speak, countries are working hard to raise public awareness of cybersecurity.

For example, a Donald Duck comic with information about online security. It’s a great way to reach target groups of all ages!

I know for certain that the GFCE will prove to be a suitable platform for creating awareness, together with local schools and business. Senegal has already registered as a partner.

Finally, responsible disclosure. Here, cooperation plays a central role as well. Not necessarily between companies or countries, but cooperation with ethical hackers.

Two years ago, the Netherlands took a historic step. Our government was the first to issue guidelines on responsible disclosure, enabling organisations and businesses to make their own policies on ethical hacking.

We now have an open culture in which ethical hackers, businesses, government authorities and scientists seek each other’s help. This enables them to repair vulnerabilities in the systems that society runs on.

I am pleased to tell you that experiences like this will be studied from an international perspective. Through the GFCE, by partners like Romania, Hungary and Hewlett Packard.

Three wonderful initiatives. And all three are essential to a secure internet.

This is why we have decided to facilitate a secretariat in the Netherlands to serve as a home base for the GFCE.

From here, we can work on strong solutions that make the internet safer and freer. From here, we can combat cybercrime. And from here, we can open the door to prosperity.

Ladies and gentlemen,

I started by citing the enormous contributions made by Turing, Von Neumann, Jobs and Berners-Lee.

The forum that we are launching here today doesn’t hold a candle to their innovative work.

But if our generation can ensure that their legacy – the internet – is more secure and stable than ever before, we too will be passing on a wonderful legacy to future generations. The GFCE is a major step forward in this endeavour.

Thank you.