– INSA graduates second batch cyber talent trainee youths
The cyber industry demands well-educated and talented experts in the sector. The world is growingly dependent on the cyber industry and the industry is growing unpredictably. With its sophisticated and complex nature, the cyber industry demands well-organized institutions, well-equipped and educated professionals and the latest technological advancements to secure the industry.
Despite the sector requires well-trained cyber professionals to exploit the sector’s potential for development and to secure the cyber infrastructure, there is a huge gap in trained professionals in the sector at worldwide, according to Information Network Security Administration (INSA). There is a huge gap in trained human resources in the cyber security sector in Ethiopia as well and INSA is working to develop skilled human resources in the cyber industry. In addition to the education and continuous capacity building of experts in the sector, INSA established the Ethio Cyber Talent Development Center to cultivate and develop the skills of talented youths in the cyber industry.
With this task, Ethio Cyber Talent Development Center, a center under INSA, started providing summer course training to develop the skills of the youths. For the first time, Ethio Cyber Talent Development Center has trained and graduated the first batch of 60 trainees in 2022 Ethiopian summer season. The first batch of graduates was trained and developed different products in website development, cyber security, and hardware development. The center is accepting talented youths starting from age nine up to high school students.
In 2023 summer camp training program, INSA’s Cyber Talent Development Center has accepted 120 youth trainees after a short assessment from the applicants. Two weeks ago, the 120 trainees graduated in the presence of higher government officials including INSA’s Director-General, Solomon Soka (replace a week ago by Tigist Hamid), and Minister of Innovation and Technology, Belete Molla (PhD).
A week ago, the Information Network Security Administration (INSA) has graduated second batch of cyber security graduates trained at the Ethio Cyber Talent Center of INSA.
Kalkidan Fekadu is among the youths who graduated from the Ethio Cyber Talent Center. The fresh university student, Kalkidan said that the training helped her not only to secure critical knowledge in the cyber security sector but also life skills, time management, and self-care during her stay in the center. Website development, cyber security, and embedded systems are among the training being provided for the youth trainees in the center, Kalkidan said. “The training includes sport, time management, psychology, self-care training, and cyber-related professional training,” Kalkidan said adding that in addition to developing cyber security knowledge, the training helped her and all trainees as well to develop additional life skills.
As to her, monitors were assigned from INSA for the trainees to support the activities of the youth that helped them to develop their skills and to realize their projects during their stay in the center. Kalkidan joined the center a year ago at the Science Museum. “Last year, I visited the Ethiopia Science Museum during its inauguration and the first batch of the Summer Camp cyber security trainee talented youths were exhibiting their products at the museum. I had an interest in the sector and after I saw the products of the youths, I asked the coordinators about the way of joining the center. I registered to join the center and after some evaluations by INSA, I joined the Cyber Talent Development Center,” she said.
During the training, Kalkidan produced her product in the programing sector. “With my team, we produced a Super App to be applied in Ethiopia like China’s Wechat,” Kalkidan said. As to her, they will continue working on developing their project to realize it. Like Kalkidan, the remaining 120 trainees also produced different types of products in hardware, software programing and cyber security sectors. Kalkidan’s team are thinking to develop the teamwork to company and she is excited to develop her skills in the cyber security sector.
For his part, Samuel Fasil, member of the second batch Cyber Security Talent graduates, said that the training equipped him to develop his talents in the cyber security sector. “The training helped me to improve my knowledge in the cyber security sector and I will continue to develop my skills in the sector to become a professional expert in the cyber industry,” Samuel added.
During the event, the then INSA Director General, Samuel Soka said that the universality, fast growing, borderless, complex, and variability nature of the cyber industry makes the sector sophisticated. The sector’s technology is also advancing from time to time that demands well trained cyber professionals. Considering the sector’s development, it is critically important to invest in capacity building of cyber professionals and cultivating talented youths so as to build strong national cyber army, Solomon underlined.
As to him, in the current world, sustaining development, protecting national sovereignty and national security is impossible without building strong and resilient national cyber army. In this regard, Ethiopia is investing its maximum capacity to develop the country’s cyber security. Solomon stated that skilled human resource development in the cyber sector, technology ownership and strong governing system of the sector are the first priorities INSA is undertaking in developing the cyber industry in Ethiopia.
As INSA focuses on building strong national cyber army, in addition to invest on the current professionals, it gathers talented youths and cultivating their talents to develop their knowledge. “Graduates of the second batch of the cyber talent are evidences that INSA is working to create strong cyber institution that equipped with talented professionals. These graduates are responsible to protect Ethiopia’s cyber security for the future,” Solomon stated.
For his part, Innovation and Technology Minister, Belete Molla (PhD) said that cyber-attack is increasing gradually and the damages from cyber-attack causing serious problems in the development and security of countries. Cyber-attacks are unpredictable and borderless that makes the sector so difficult; Belete said adding that to protect a country’s national interest, building resilient cyber industry with well trained professional army is a must for every nation.
Cyber-attack attacks are exposing a given country to economic deficiency, infrastructural damage, threatening its security and affect human’s wellbeing. Therefore, producing creative citizens, providing continuous training and the like would bring significant outcomes in the sector and INSA’s efforts is bringing meaningful improvement in the sector, he stated.
Meanwhile, recently INSA announced that 4,623 attempted cyber-attacks targeting critical government and private institutions were registered during the past six months of this budget year. According to the institution, thanks to the 24 hours alerted cyber army, INSA has successfully thwarted 98.56 percent of the cyber-attack attempts during the past six months of this budget year.
Solomon said that if the attempted attacks were succeeded, the country could have loss over 10.5 billion birr. As to him, this shows that protecting the cyber infrastructure remains critical to ensure economic development and secure national interest. In addition, the cyber-attack attempts are targeting critical development and financial sectors. In addition to the efforts of INSA to secure the nation’s cyber sector, Solomon accentuated the need for collective action of individuals and institutions in awareness creation of citizens.
BY DARGIE KAHSAY
THE ETHIOPIAN HERALD FRIDAY 16 FEBRUARY 2024
