Our paper was selected by the University of North Georgia for presentation on the 8-9 Nov 2017.
Abstract
South Africa’s prospects of effective cyber defense
by Given Shingange & Prof Dr. Dr Bruce W. Watson
Many countries all over the world are finding themselves trying to figure out how best to tackle cyber defense challenges that continue to be on the rise. This has led to country specific initiatives, regional alliance initiatives and new relationships being formed. The purpose of the paper is to taxonomize the national challenges facing South Africa’s attempts at establishing an effective cyber defense policy. This will be achieved by looking at the current (South African) National Cybersecurity Policy Framework and comparing it with those of other countries that are classified as similar to South Africa.
The research of course shows that every country has its own unique challenges that have to be properly analyzed before attempts to implement policies are put in place. The taxonomy adds value by indicating the magnitude of the challenges and how they differ from other countries. In South Africa’s case, one factor that stands out is the fact that South Africa is a fairly new democracy that has gone through a couple of metamorphoses – including the fusion of armed disparate armed forces – which have significant impact on the path forward.
What our research will show is the dependencies between the solutions that the first world countries come up with and the problems that are faced by the second world countries. If a first world country is struggling to find solutions or decide on what needs to be done within the cyber defense environment, this automatically means those countries that depend on the first world country stand to suffer the most. Because of the technological dependencies the second world countries such as South Africa find themselves having to find solutions outside of the normal status quo as provided by those who may have been in the lead.
Given SHINGANGE 