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Taiwan's new digital minister talks about digital resilience amid China's cyber threats
Digital resilience is essential to accelerate digital transformation and for inclusive digital society.
TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — The escalation of malicious cyber activities and attacks has been reported by government agencies and utility companies in Taiwan since last week after a visit by U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, which coincides with the announcement of the country's first digital affairs minister who on Monday (August 8) spoke on digital resilience, a goal of the new ministry, in the face of various challenges to the Taiwanese government and industries.
Think differently
Three days after the Cabinet unveiled Audrey Tang (唐鳯) as head of the Ministry of Digital Affairs (MODA), the self-taught programmer and retired entrepreneur was invited to give a speech on Monday to representatives of the country's technology sector dedicated to digital transformation. Tang assured the industry that the role of the ministry is "to coordinate and to connect" rather than "to supervise and to regulate."
The forum was held by Digital Taiwan Roundtable and a unique appreciation award was given to Tang in the form of a nonfungible token (NFT) by the head of the organization's chair, Luis Ko (高志明).
The ministry is tasked with building up digital resilience that is essential to accelerate digital transformation, to boost the country's digital competitiveness for an inclusive digital society, and to empower democracy, she said.
The 41-year-old is set to be the youngest minister in the Cabinet. She pointed out that the ministry is relatively flexible and open-minded in terms of recruitment compared to other government agencies, valuing candidates' field-related work experience rather than academic credentials. This new recruitment strategy, which is quite different from the typical hiring practices of Taiwan's civil servants, will also apply to hiring talent for the upcoming digital think tank under the ministry, the National Institute for Cyber Security.
Tang herself never finished high school because she found herself more suited to writing code, and she founded a tech company at the age of 16.
A safer website
The event took place after days of cyberattacks believed to be launched by Chinese and Russian hackers. Several websites of central and local government agencies and utilities companies have been targeted, including the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of National Defense.
Tang said the website of the digital ministry was created with "InterPlanetary File System (IPFS)," a peer-to-peer hypermedia protocol that works very similar to the blockchain network and is designed to make the web faster, safer, more reliable and more open compared to traditional websites.
"If the IPFS-based website works well, it can be applied to other government websites to boost security," she added.
Tang also thanked Ko, the head of the Digital Taiwan Roundtable, for advocating the establishment of the ministry.
The main departments under the ministry are as follows: Department of Digital Strategy; Department of Communications and Cyber Resilience; Department of Resource Management; Department of Digital Service; Department of Democracy Network, which facilitates global collaboration, plural innovation; and two administrations - one for cyber security and the other for digital industries.
There will be two main locations for its operation, including one adjacent to the biggest transportation hub, Taipei Main Station, to better connect with tech hubs in different cities across the country.
The original article: Taiwan's new digital minister talks about digital resilience amid China's cyber threats
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