Ministry of Science and ICT to establish and announce cyber threat response strategy
Plans to build cyber security big data center capable of analyzing data

"Unlike the past when cyber threats targeted system disruption or information leakage, cyber risks are now evolving toward ransomware aimed at financial gain"

As smart homes, smart factories, autonomous vehicles and other cloud services proliferate, creating a hyper-connected society, cyber attack targets have expanded uncontrollably.

At the 5th Security Next Conference hosted by ZDNet Korea on the 12th, Heo Sung-wook, Director of Information Security Planning at the Ministry of Science and Technology, Information and Communication, delivered the keynote address, stating, "Cyber threats can no longer be addressed by a single private enterprise, a single government ministry, or a single nation," and noted that cyber attacks are directly linked to national economy, security, public safety, and social trust.

The Ministry of Science and Technology and the Korea Internet & Security Agency (KISA) announced that they will address uncertainties in the Fourth Industrial Revolution era by securing cyber safety through △advancing cyber threat response systems, △ensuring ICT safety in daily life, and △strengthening cyber security fundamental capabilities.


The policy is to diagnose vulnerabilities targeting key facilities and multi-use services and strengthen collaboration between public and private sectors and across various fields. The plan is to expand detection scope to cover growing IoT and unstructured data and conduct monitoring based on artificial intelligence for proactive prevention. As a main project, a cyber security big data center will be established to collect attack data and share analysis information with enterprises.

The ministry announced it will expand security consulting for small and medium enterprises to help them build response capabilities and revitalize cyber insurance.

Director Heo stated, "IoT requires hardware-level security. It is difficult unless security is embedded from the product development stage," and "Once ransomware strikes, there is no solution. Proactive prevention is important, and all we can do after an incident is prevent damage from spreading," adding that security guidelines for ICT convergence industries will be prepared.

To strengthen cyber security fundamental capabilities, investment in security technology development will be expanded to 100 billion won by 2022, and next-generation security technologies such as biometric authentication, forensics, and blockchain will be developed. The ministry is also reviewing ways to monetize pricing for security continuous service requested by security companies and make disclosure requirements mandatory for companies above a certain scale regarding corporate security status.

Director Heo noted, "It is difficult to find security developers," and stated, "Now, to secure fintech, we need people who understand finance to handle security, not just those who know security alone," adding that security-specialized graduate schools for strategic industries by region will be expanded from the Seoul metropolitan area nationwide to foster specialized security talent.

In addition to talent cultivation, plans are underway to build an information security cluster in Pangyo to foster startups and create jobs to nurture the security industry.