Top Israeli security expert and hi-tech engineer with experience in Home Land Security and Cyber Projects, Aviad Marco has disclosed that the leading export product and foreign currency earner for Israel is cyber security and allied products.
In an interview, he said “More than 450 Israeli companies are developing and producing unique cyber products,” noting that “Israel cyber solutions are covering a range of threats and risk on all communication and information entities, including back office, main frames, Personal Computers [PC], personal devices, personal smart phones, communication and control systems, navigation systems, critical facilities, private cars and public transportation”.
“Today, cyber crime and terrorism is on the rise around the world, but we detect more and more cyber attacks from various sources. Israel is ranked highest for cyber-security. Also, the Israeli cyber security industry is estimated to represent seven percent of global sales and eight percent of global investments.
He said this represents an annual export of more than $3b. Companies such as IBM, Cisco, General Electric (GE), have established Research and Development cyber centers in Israel. One in six computers is protected by anti-virus software developed in Israel.
On ways counter-cyber technology can help the growth of Nigeria’s education sector, Marco said it depends on what we are doing and what are the applications.
He said for example, in cyber, we are protecting all the information that is being used. Imagine what would happen if you are unable to provide salaries for your teachers, due to a problem in the Information Technology (IT) infrastructure.
On how counter-cyber crimes technology can be deployed to curb terrorism, kidnapping and sundry crimes in Nigeria, he took inspiration from the Boston terror attacks that happened several years ago, saying “In order to prevent further occurrences, first of all, you are dealing with a lot of crowd, you have to be aware that something can happen and you don’t know where it will come from. In order to apprehend the terrorists, of course, they used homeland security cameras and different face recognition technology that really helped to identify the terrorists and they were able to discover those terrorists through the different applications”.
“When you are going to mount a mast, for example, you have different locations, you want to protect cities, you want to protect infrastructure, and places that are very crowded. This technology allows you to take mass information.
“For example, If you want to locate one person within millions of people, if you want to locate different things that happened during that time, this technology will aid you. Basically, you have to be prepared. Unfortunately, you have bad experiences with terrorism here in Abuja and in different states in Nigeria.
“Today that your population is growing fast and the amount of terrorism and terror groups are increasing, you have to be prepared, take control and be aware of those situations that take other nations by storm with devastating consequences. You must have technology in place,” Marco noted.
