Q3/2018 - Russian President Putin, Cyber Security Congress

On 4 July 2018, the Russian financial institution Sberbank organised a hig-cablibre conference on cybersecurity. The key note was delivered by the Russian Presidient Vladimir Putin. In his speech, he pointed out that Russia, and Russian banks in particular, were permanent targest of cyber attacks from abroad. But Russia was going to fight back and take the necessary defence measures. Putin announced in his speech the launch of a four-point cyber-defence-program. He further repeated the proposals he had already made at other occasions, i.e. to jointly develop international instruments for combating cyber crime and a code of conduct in cyberspace under the auspices of the United Nations.

Putin expressed his regret about the persistent negative attitude of the western states and their resistance to engage in these projects. He did not mention though the order he had placed with the Russion National Security Council to develop an alternative root server system to the ICANN root. The Russian-American bilateral cyber consultion program Russia proposed a few days later at the Putin-Trump summit in Helsinki was rejected by the USA. Among the congress attendants were John Crain from ICANN, Head of the Centre for Cybersecurity of the Davos World Economic Forum, and Meng Hongwei, President of Interpol.