Q1/2019 - Siemens - Charter of Trust

In the margins of the Munich Security Conference, Siemens organised a round table on 15 February 2019 to mark the first anniversary of the signing of the “Charter of Trust”^[1]. The Charter had been signed by Siemens and eight partners from the industry at the Munich Security Conference in February 2018. Since then, the Charter has grown to 16 members: Next to Siemens and the Munich Security Conference these include Airbus, Allianz, Atos, Cisco, Daimler, Dell Technologies, Deutsche Telekom, Enel, IBM, MSC, NXP, SGS and TÜV SÜD. With the German Federal Office for Information Security (BSI) and the National Cryptologic Center (CCN) of Spain, the Charter has won two government authorities as associated members. Graz University of Technology has also voiced its intention to become an associated member to the Charter. Mitsubishi Heavy Industries has announced to join the Charter as the first Asian company in September 2019.

Siemen‘s CEO Joe Kaeser acknowledged the “Charter of Trust” as an important contribution to enhance cyber security. He referred to growing cybercrime, hacker attacks on government systems, and the need to close security holes in hardware and software. Cyber attacks had caused more than 500 billion euros in global damage in 2018. In 2017, the number of networked devices used around the globe had been roughly 8.4 billion, which had been a 31-percent increase on 2016. By 2020, this figure was expected to have risen to 20.4 billion. "In the age of the internet of things, the cybersecurity is a crucial task. Our Charter of Trust initiative is a very important first step," said Joe Kaeser. "We're open to many more partners. Cybersecurity is the key enabler for successful digital businesses as well as protecting critical infrastructure. We hope that this initiative will lead to a lively public awareness and, ultimately, to binding rules and standards."

Germany’s Federal Minister for Economic Affairs and Energy, Peter Altmaier, assured Siemens of the government’s support for the initiative. The German Federal Office for Information Security (BSI) joined the Charter as an associate member. Altmeier pointed out that the UN Internet Governance Forum (IGF) in Berlin in November 2019 was a good opportunity for continuing the international dialogue on strengthening stability and security in cyber space in a result-focused manner.

One of the practical effects of the Charter is an agreement on basic cyber security requirements for digital supply chains. These include the protection of data throughout its life cycle and minimum requirements for the training of IT security staff. The members to the Charter plan to implement these tasks in their own global supply chains and to involve their suppliers in the process. The supply chain is considered the weakest point in a company's cyber security ecosystem: 60 percent of all cyber attacks can be traced back to links of the supply chain. And according to Accenture Strategy, 92 percent of all cyber incidents can be attributed to small companies.

In the name of its 16 members, the Charter of Trust signed the Paris Call for Trust and Security in Cyberspace presented by French President in November.