According to the federal government, 70% of Canadian businesses have been victims of cyber-attacks. To address this, Ontario has hired Ray Boisvert, the former assistant director of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, to be its first provincial security advisor.
According to Public Safety Canada, the country has the heaviest internet users in the world. Cyber awareness, however, remains one of the main challenges for the government.
In an interview with Ontario broadcaster TVO, Boisvert addressed the pervasiveness nature of cyber-threats and the importance of educating the citizens on cyber awareness as the first step to achieve cyber resilience.
“There is no perfect solution to cybersecurity. There is a series of things that need to occur over time, starting with situational awareness, understanding the issues that are threatening our society,” Boisvert said.
Ray Boisvert has more than 30 years of experience in the national security field. He is the former assistant director of intelligence and director general of the counter-terrorism program at Canadian Security Intelligence Service.
In his new role, which has no precedent in the province, he provides advice and intelligence on national security matters that fall under provincial responsibility; including efforts to build critical provincial infrastructure resilience and engaging with provincial security partners.
“As we start creating the insights around intelligence-driven decision making that we are looking to develop, we will be able to better inform senior government decision makers about what sort of things need to get done to make our society more resilient to cyber-threats,” he said.