First ever National Youth Summit on Cyber Security tomorrow

Sri Lanka’s first ever National Youth Summit on Cyber Security will be held tomorrow at the BMICH, Colombo.

More than 350 school children and teachers from advanced level classes representing schools nationwide will attend the youth summit. The youth summit is the latest addition to the series of annual events titled ‘Cyber Security Summit’, now on its fifth year. The summit and the youth summit are organised by CICRA Holdings – Sri Lanka’s pioneering cyber security training, certification and consultancy organisation and Daily FT – the country’s only business and finance newspaper.

Minister of Telecommunication and Digital Infrastructure Harin Fernando will be the chief guest of the event while Information and Communication Technology Agency (ICTA) Managing Director/CEO Muhunthan Canagey and Sri Lanka Computer Emergency Readiness Team Coordination Centre (SL CERT) CEO Lal Dias will be among key speakers.

Jake Davis, a Cyber Security Expert from United Kingdom will deliver the Keynote speech at the youth summit while Senior Cyber Security Consultant at BAE Systems Applied Intelligence, Australia, Mike Monnik will also speak.

Dialog Axiata Group Cyber Security Officer G.  Balachandran, 99XCountry Manager Kushan Ratnapala and SLCERT Information Security Engineer Roshan Chandraguptha will also speak at the youth summit.Deakin University Australia is the strategic partner of the youth summit while People’s Bank is the Banking Partner; SriLankan Airlines is the Official Airline Partner.

CICRA Holdings Group Director/CEO Boshan Dayaratne said that they intend to empower the youth with the knowledge on latest global trends in cyber security and holistic career guidance on the cyber security profession through the youth summit.

“Since a majority of the youth are unaware of the importance of cyber security, we believe that we are supporting a core area of the journey towards digital Sri Lanka through this initiative,” said Dayaratne.

The youth summit is free for all participants but requires prior registration.

Apart from the youth summit, the Cyber Security Summit has three components: Full Day Conference, Night Hack and the invitation only CEOs Forum on Cyber Security as a Board Room Discussion. During the 2016 summit, there were more than 350 participants attending the Day Conference, 300 persons attending the Night Hack and over 100 CEOs participating in the CEOs Forum.

This year’s Cyber Security Summit and the Night Hack will be held on 27 September while the CEOs Forum will be held on 28 September. More details can be accessed on www.cybersecuritysummit.lk.