Martin Dinel is a Computer Science Engineering graduate from Laval University (Sainte Foy, Quebec CANADA) with over 32 years of experience in various information technology-related leadership roles across both public sector and private sector organizations, with a focus on cybersecurity. Since 2015, he has been in responsible for the cybersecurity program of the Government of Alberta, a province of Canada, and since early 2020, Data Analytics, Artificial Intelligence, Digital Service, Provincial Broadband, and overall IT Modernization have been added to his new portfolio as Executive Lead for Innovation, Modernization, and Cybersecurity.
While 2020 has been a challenging year for everyone, this year, in addition to seeing his work responsibilities increase with more exciting opportunities, Martin also got engaged to the love of his life, Nelia, and became a grandfather for the first time with the birth of his granddaughter, Amelia Rose.
What are your main security concerns and what are you prioritising at the moment?
As my organization increases its service digitization pace, our risk appetite also increased. We are seeing a wide focus on the adoption of and migration to cloud-based solutions, testing new technologies, all while the number and sophistication of attacks on our organization continues to increase. Our highest priority at this point in time is securing our cloud services through the adoption of improved authentication mechanisms, as well as safer data encryption technologies for data at rest and in transit.
What have been the biggest challenges around COVID-19 for your organisation? And, how are you addressing them?
The biggest challenge is also our biggest opportunity! It is the willingness of the business to digitize more services and embrace new technologies. The challenge comes in the form of the number of digitization requests we get and the number of new technologies we must deal with along with limited funding, and the opportunity is that we are modernizing our services faster than we ever had before.
To help deal with the challenges, from an IT perspective, my new role was created. As a senior executive in our organization, I am now both responsible for innovations and modernization, while at the same time, I am responsible for ensuring the protection of our data and technology assets. From a business perspective, we have implemented new governance processes that ensure that IT continues to advise business, but business are the key stakeholders making decisions for the organization.
What is your advice on balancing security and digitalisation?
Do exactly what our organization did:
1. From an IT perspective, make the person in charge of innovation and modernization responsible for security as well!
2. Put the business in charge of making IT decisions placing IT resources in an advisor role.
3. Employ a risk-based decision-making process (focus on benefits, costs, but also on the risk of doing and risk of not doing).
What do the next 5 years hold for your industry?
From a cybersecurity perspective, to keep it simple, more work opportunities and more work! More work because malicious actors’ activity continues to increase over time, but also, services provided by cybersecurity personnel will not only increase, but they will also evolve with the advent of more advanced analytics, machine learning, robotics process automation, and artificial intelligence solutions. Cybersecurity personnel will need to continue to learn and adapt to deal with these new solutions and technologies.
Also – if nothing gets done to bring more people into the cybersecurity field – there will be a long term shortage of cybersecurity expertise. However, organizations are starting to recognize this fact. The Government of Alberta, for instance, is currently working with universities and colleges to develop a new cybersecurity apprenticeship program. I can see more organizations doing the same over the next few years.
Connect with Martin in the North American segment of Cyber World Congress on March 2nd! Join him as he moderates the live panel discussion ‘Are You Prepared for the Changing Security Threat Landscape?‘ at 10:35am (EDT) alongside Liana Bailey-Crimmins (CISO, CalPERS), Nick Ritter (CISO, First Financial Bank), Jeffrey Ericson (CISO, MedRisk), and Marty Ray (CISO, Fossil Group).
Find out more and secure your place at Cyber World Congress – the world’s only 24-hour cyber security event on March 2nd for FREE* using the complimentary discount code: ALBERTA
Book now at world.cyberseries.io/register/
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