Sri Lanka integrates cybersecurity precepts into digital blueprint

The competition facing the digital economy from both legitimate digital economies and the more dangerous scam economies calls for strong cybersecurity measures, especially in the global South, underlining their fundamental necessity for protecting businesses and fostering economic growth, a top official said.

“In the digital world, we are no longer an island, and we are connected. We have competition from the global digital economies in many aspects, such as commerce, growth, value creation, talent, etc. The scam economy is also another big competitor, which is worth more than one trillion dollars. And 60% of that is in Asia. Therefore, not only do we need to compete with the global digital economies, but we also need to compete with the scam economy, which is why the cyber infrastructure becomes a cornerstone to the entire picture of a digital economy and infrastructure landscape,” Chief Advisor to the President on Digital Economy, Dr. Hans Wijayasuriya said.

Speaking at the National Cyber Security Conference in Colombo recently, he said digital methodologies and tools such as AI are pervading all sectors of economies today and are now located at the epicentre of a country’s competitiveness. The competitive advantage of a country, he said, will be largely determined by the competitiveness of a digital economy, and to accelerate this growth in Sri Lanka, the government has a digital economy blueprint, which has trust and inclusion embedded in it. “We have cybersecurity precepts built into the design of the blueprint. It is an AI-first blueprint where we will be using AI wherever possible.”

The connection between the digital economy and the macro economy shows a positive contribution to overall economic growth, and in sectors like cybersecurity and digital transformation, efforts are focused on advancing Sri Lanka’s economy rather than just executing IT projects or automation, he added.

He said the target is to improve the country’s global standing in digital benchmarks related to trust and cyber resilience.

Article Topics

cybersecurity  |  digital economy  |  digital inclusion  |  digital public infrastructure  |  digital trust  |  Sri Lanka