CyberSpark Newsletter

Dear Friends and Members,

I am pleased to send you CyberSpark's quarterly e-newsletter. I hope you will find it interesting and useful. I encourage you to contact the writers or myself with any thoughts, questions or concerns you may have.

On December 18, 2017 CyberSpark will hold a TEDx event on the cyber domain, at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. Among the speakers at the event will be subject matter experts from various fields in the ecosystem. All lectures will be uploaded to Internet platforms immediately following the event.

On October 30, 2017 CyberSpark will hold The 1st Global Workshop on Cyber Security in Future Mobility. This workshop will bring together world renowned experts to discuss the very complex issues of cyber security in the automotive industry . Be sure to save the date!

I invite you to stay connected and follow us on our website and on Facebook.

Kind Regards,
Anat Karmona,
Affiliates Club Manager
CyberSpark

Word of the CEO

Dear Partners and Affiliates,

As we enter the last quarter of 2017, we can easily identify some major trends in the Cyber domain, trends that reflect a global change of mindset across entire ecosystems of Governments, Academia, and Industry.
Such terms as Innovation, Global Collaboration and Glocalization take center stage, as leaders in the field meet at numerous and frequent events worldwide, sharing both their concerns and their vision.
The predominant idea currently spreading throughout the Cyber community, is to collaborate over international platforms so as to address the challenges, both global and local, shared by all players. This would include those skilled in the Cyber field, a sharing of knowledge, free access to databases for innovation acceleration, global discussion on regulation, and so on.
Global EPIC, an initiative co-founded by CyberSpark, Be’er-Sheva, with ECIT, Belfast and CUNET, Ottawa, has taken upon itself the task of creating such a platform. Once the platform is accommodated by ecosystems with similar DNA from around the world, it will co-create and adopt world-changing solutions to high-impact cybersecurity challenges, such as facilitating safer deployment of technologies that enrich our way of life. It will become the leading global platform for cybersecurity-related entrepreneurism and innovation.
Another exciting venture CyberSpark is deeply engaged with, is the establishment of Living Labs for R&D, resilience assessment, and certification. The aim is to apply highly advanced and recognized testing methodologies to evaluate the resilience of holistic systems such as Healthcare, Smart-Mobility and Finance, while using an authentic environment and being subjected to “Cyber hostile” conditions.

More in the next Newsletter, in December.

Roni Zehavi,
CEO, CyberSpark

Air Traffic Resilience – Holistic Approaches to Building a Cyber Resilient Foundation for Global Aviation

Dr. Tobias Kiesling

Due to its importance and prominence, air transport infrastructure is an attractive target for cyber attacks. Its current system is already vulnerable, while the advent of more automation and the pervasion of standard IT leads to ever more complex and interconnected systems providing an increasing attack surface. To cope with this situation, we need suitable risk-oriented methods and tools to achieve situation awareness of the consequences in potential cyber threat situations. This is an essential foundation for achieving cyber resilience of the global aviation infrastructure.
ARIEL (an acronym for Air Traffic Resilience) is a German research project contributing to the creation of such a foundation. The ARIEL consortium led by IABG is composed of several central aviation entities including Airbus, the German air traffic control organization DFS, the German Aerospace Center DLR, the interdisciplinary aviation research center Bauhaus Luftfahrt and the University of Applied Sciences Munich. The consortium is complemented by the Fraunhofer Institute for Applied and Integrated Security and the Cyber Defence Research Institute of the University of the German Federal Armed Forces.

The overall objective of ARIEL is the development and evaluation of holistic methodologies for cyber threat and risk analysis. In addition, it focuses on specific security measures aimed at improving the cyber resilience of several central components of the air traffic system, including aircraft and communication, navigation and surveillance systems. The scenario-driven and tool-supported analysis approach of ARIEL includes methodologies for the modeling of holistic threat and risk. Furthermore, ARIEL demonstrates the exploitation of existing computer simulation systems to support cyber risk analysis on an operational level. Major findings of the project are documented in the publicly available ARIEL recommendations.

Dr. Tobias Kiesling, Senior Program Manager for Cyber Defense at IABG (http://www.iabg.de), is leading the ARIEL project (http://lb-campus.com/de/forschung/ariel)

Cyber security in the era of the quantum computer

Prof. Shlomi Dolev

With the commercialization of quantum computers, quantum safe cyber security has become an emerging field both in research and cyber security industries. The security infrastructure of the Internet and public key infrastructure are at great risk of becoming obsolete, not only due to the fact that the one-way functions used by Diffie and Hellman (DH), Rivest, Shamir and Adelman (RSA) can be easily broken by quantum computers (Peter Shor algorithm), but also due to the fact that possible candidates for replacement (such as SVP) are at risk of future breaks as well.
This presents a great opportunity to re-examine the entire structure of Internet security. Before the introduction of modern cryptography, two parties seeking to communicate securely had to physically meet, or send a person to carry either a secret key, or preferably a secret book with random letters, each letter to be used no more than once. The introduction just a few decades ago of schemes that create a symmetric secret key between two parties, without the need for them to physically meet, has been a dramatic revolution in secure communication. The price was, what was then, a minimal risk of powerful computers breaking the one-way function and revealing the communication content. This led to the introduction of trusted third parties and certification authorities to identify an entity with its public key.
There have been reports in recent years of many breakdowns in the functioning of certification authorities whose secret keys are in fact the basis of security for the entire Internet. Newer technologies based on block-chain and secret sharing, along the lines of Secret Double Octopus technologies, can form a bullet and quantum proof solution. In this case, the identity and signature keys are managed by public block-chain infrastructure and secret creation. Signatures are then carried along several paths, each of which individually containing information that is provably useless.

Prof. Shlomi Dolev, Rita Altura Trust Chair in Computer Sciences, (https://www.cs.bgu.ac.il/~dolev/) and Cyber Security Entrepreneur, Co Founder and Chief Scientist of Secret Double Octopus (https://doubleoctopus.com/)

GCR: Co-create Globally; Benefit Locally

Tony Bailetti, Dan Craigen

In Ottawa, Canada, a novel business accelerator, the Global Cybersecurity Resource (GCR), launched by Carleton University, is addressing the cybersecurity challenge head-on. Operating from Bayview Yards, the premier innovation hub in Canada’s capital city, the GCR is equipping high growth companies with the skills, resources and linkages required to develop novel cyber products and services that meet growing demand and capture global markets.
Uniquely positioned at the intersection of cybersecurity, entrepreneurship and open source innovation, and leveraging critical funding from the Government of Canada through FedDev Ontario, the GCR enables and accelerates the commercial success of high-growth scale-up companies that:
•Focus on cybersecurity technologies, products and services for global markets; or
•Use cybersecurity as a key product differentiator.
The GCR builds directly upon entrepreneurial R&D conducted at Carleton’s Technology Innovation Management program and the internationally acclaimed Lead to Win Program, recognized as one of the top ten University Business Incubators (UBI) in North America in 2015. The GCR underscores Carleton University’s commitment to developing the Ottawa economy.
Cybersecurity is a global challenge and successful scale-ups must engage global markets. The GCR engages cybersecurity ecosystems globally to address shared “big picture” objectives through a glocalization perspective: “localize the global and globalize the local” and “co-create globally; benefit locally.”
Building upon the above, a rigorous set of economic metrics and a world of opportunity, the GCR provides four types services to client companies:
•Access to a Global Network of Cybersecurity Ecosystems: Including soft landings; international connectivity; ecosystem-specific information and shared operational tools and facilities.
•The Lead to Win Cyber Program (LTW-Cyber): Supports client companies by identifying, assessing and providing recommendations on product/market fit; developing scale-up strategies; perfecting pitches; crafting funding proposals; acquiring first customers, etc.
•Managed Services: Provides client companies with alerts from an open-source based security operations centre.
•Talent Transfer: Provides client companies and other organizations with access to highly qualified (cybersecurity) specialists having cultivated expertise through novel pedagogical approaches.
While the GCR is new, it is already having both local and global impact – the glocalization agenda is being successfully pursued.

Tony Bailetti is the Director of Carleton University’s Technology Innovation Management Program and the Principal Investigator for the Global Cybersecurity Resource. He can be contacted at [email protected].

Dan Craigen is the Director of the Global Cybersecurity Resource. He can be contacted at [email protected].

What do Camels, Cyber Security, and Artificial Intelligence have in common? Be'er Sheva!

Adv. Oleg Brodt

The southern city of Be'er Sheva is experiencing a steady influx of high-tech talent. Established in 2014, the Be'er Sheva High-Tech Park has become home to many Israeli companies, as well as multinational high-tech companies that chose to relocate here and establish development centers for a first-hand experience of cooperation with Israeli industry and academia. Within just three years, Be'er Sheva has welcomed some 70 Israeli and multinational companies. Dozens of high-tech start-ups have been established here, while one of them has already registered an exit leading to the establishment of PayPal's development center in the city. Be'er Sheva is today host to some 10 newly established acceleration programs (accelerators and incubators). In addition, the city was chosen as a pilot city in the national "Digital Israel" program. This was partly due to its experience with digital social initiatives, such as the establishment of the Center for Digital Innovation (CDI), which focuses on philanthropic innovation in fields lacking economic incentives. Be'er Sheva is the site of a new Cyber Research Center - a collaboration between Ben-Gurion University and the National Cyber Bureau of the Prime Minister's Office, while growth continues with a range of additional initiatives currently underway, such as an experimental park for autonomous vehicles and UAVs.
The influx and growth of the hi-tech sector has been so rapid that many residents are not yet aware of the new technological park being built in their city. The park already houses about 2,000 engineers and developers in two huge buildings, with a third building currently under construction. Upon completion, the park is slated to include 15 buildings, which will house approximately 10,000 high-tech personnel. The city's growth potential was identified by WeWork, which hastened to set up a communal workspace in one of the park's buildings, even before it expanded to other parts of the world long recognized as international technology centers.
In addition to the 15-building section, the park will include a separate section of the same size again, designated as a military campus. Most of the military computer and software units currently in the center of the country will be relocated here as part of the IDF's move southward. The campus will include a cyber training facility, a new intelligence center, and a group of compounds that will be a new home to IDFs IT and software units.
The Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Be'er Sheva has already begun the construction of its northern campus, which is expected to double the university size and significantly increase its student capacity, which has doubled itself every decade (from 5,000 students 20 years ago, to about 20,000 students registered this year). With the completion of the northern campus, the establishment of Be'er Sheva's emerging eco-system, including academia, start-ups, industry, military and civilian government sectors, will be complete.
Not only is interest in Be'er Sheva growing, the flow of visitors is increasing as well. For example, while in 2015 the park hosted about 200 official visits of business delegations from around the world, in 2016 - with the enactment of regulations giving subsidies to park residents engaged in the cyber field - the park hosted delegations from some 300 different sources, including car and aircraft manufacturers, banks and other financial institutions, energy and telecom companies, electronics manufacturers and chip-making companies, cyber and software companies, multinational high-tech companies, venture capital funds and many others. Among the visitors were senior officials of foreign governments, and senior members of worldwide academia. They come to learn from the Be'er Sheva experience, so as to replicate it in other locations, as well as consider settling down.
In contrast with this rapid growth, it is an unfortunate fact that despite Be'er Sheva's being a major source of manpower for Israel's high-tech industry, the city's graduates of Ben-Gurion University, the Technological College, and the Sami Shamoon College, have had difficulty finding employment here and have had to relocate to the center and north of the country. With the establishment in the city of the hi-tech park and the creation of new high-tech jobs, this trend is now reversing, and many graduates can now choose to start their careers in a variety of new companies in Be'er Sheva.
The first multinational company to be located in Be'er Sheva was the telecommunications giant, Deutsche Telekom, which employs over 200,000 people worldwide. The company began cooperating with Ben-Gurion University in 2004. Since then, cooperation between them has deepened with the joint establishment of the Telekom Innovation Labs, which moved from Ben-Gurion University to the first completed building in the new high-tech park. Most of the projects carried out by university researchers for the German telecom giant deal with cyber security and artificial intelligence. Among the first collaborative projects was an in-depth examination of security mechanisms in the Android operating system for the first time in the world, before its release to the market by Google via T-Mobile US. Other projects have involved the development of new technologies to address future cyber problems, such as deep IoT security, Machine Learning, and Deep Learning applications in Cyber Security and Adversarial AI.
It is no coincidence that Deutsche Telekom has chosen to cooperate with Israel's academia in the cyber field. Research shows that, on average, academia precedes the industry by a gap of about two years in terms of cyber research innovation. This insight has led other companies, including Dell/EMC, Lockheed Martin, Astronautics, PayPal, and many others to announce research collaborations with Ben-Gurion University. Moreover, many multinational companies considering entry into Israel see Ben-Gurion University as their first priority for the establishment of R&D operations in Israel. The advantage for international companies is in setting up a joint research project with the university, or a limited entry (such as via WeWork in Be'er Sheva), for a rapid assessment of manpower quality and the Israeli business environment, while taking minimal economic risk.
Ben-Gurion University has established its positioning as a center of knowledge in the areas of artificial intelligence and cyber security, and is consistently ranked as a global leader in these fields. Last year, the university was ranked 18th among the best young universities in the world (QS Top 50 under 50). It ranked one place behind Princeton and two places behind Yale for universities with the highest number of patents filed in the US (US Intellectual Property Owners Association ranking 2016). Most of these patents were submitted in the areas of cyber security, artificial intelligence, and computer engineering. The fact that Ben-Gurion University is the only university in Israel to offer engineering degrees in Cyber Security and in Big Data Analytics, is an added attraction drawing students from the elite technological units of the military, who are often later recruited to work in various companies in the high-tech park, even during their academic studies.
Other drivers of the park's success are the Be'er Sheva Municipality and the Government. The municipality knocked on the doors of every relevant government office in an effort to convince them that the project was of strategic national importance. In response, the Government offered two major avenues of assistance. The Government is granting subsidies to park residents involved in cyber research. In addition it is working to prevent regulatory interventions that would act as negative incentives.
To complete the picture, tenders have already been initiated within the framework of the IDF's IT campus in the Be'er Sheva High-Tech Park. The campus will serve as a new home for IDF units such as LOTEM, and the Israel Air Force software unit, Ofek. This will introduce into the region additional manpower from former military personnel who have been trained for technological tasks and employed upon their release from military service. Such an injection of skilled work force will act as another step in the transformation of Be'er Sheva as it becomes Israel's capital of cyber and other advanced technologies.

Adv. Oleg Brodt is the R&D Director of Deutsche Telekom Innovation Labs, Israel

http://tlabs.bgu.ac.il/