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ARNE SCHÖNBOHM Germany’s national cyber security authority is leading the initiative to make certification key to the country’s defensive strategy. ARNE SCHÖNBOHM IS PRESIDENT OF GERMANY’S NATIONAL CYBER SECURITY authority, the Federal Office for Information Security (Bundesamt für Sicherheit in der Informationstechnik (known as the BSI for short). The agency upholds and promotes IT security throughout the federal republic. Formed in 1991, the BSI is primarily the central IT security service provider for the country’s central government. However, it also offers its services to a range of technology manufacturers, the internet industry, along with private sector and commercial users. The BSI investigates cyber security risks associated with IT operations, and develops preventive security measures. This aspect of its work includes IT security testing and assessment, in co-operation with industry. It also analyses development and trends in IT. In addition, the organisation issues warnings about emergent cyber security threats, such as ransomware. It acts also as a go-between, when security industry researchers discover stolen data in the Dark Net and want to alert the data’s legitimate owners to their loss. This year (2019) has also seen the BSI President drawn into in the public debate over whether telecoms equipment from Chinese vendor Huawei should be permitted to form part of Germany’s national 5G network as it builds-out. BSI experts have found no cause for concern in using Huawei kit. BIOGRAPHY
Arne Schönbohm leads a BSI team of more than 600 employees, based across the agency’s various Bonn headquarters, where its specialist departments also issue a range of technical guidelines, standards and certifications. Along with Polizeilichen Kriminalprävention der Länder und des Bundes (ProPK), the BSI is also a coauthor of the new Digital Barometer, a ‘citizen survey’ of cyber crime in Germany, that was published in September.
The secure handling of information has become one of the key factors for the success of a company. CSE: From your previous experience as a senior business executive, what has proved most valuable in your current role as President of the BSI? ARNE SCHÖNBOHM: The BSI president of the needs to be an advocate in the matter of cyber security. The BSI has established an intensive dialogue with all relevant stakeholders, in particular with the public and private sectors. The German Alliance for Cybersecurity, initiated by the BSI, is a good example for a joint platform that includes valuable recommendations and ‘best practices‚ to protect enterprise networks against cyber attack incidents, for both
ARNE SCHÖNBOHM Arne Schönbohm has been BSI president since 2016. Formerly, he was CEO of BSS BuCET Shared Services AG, which advised the private and public sector on digitalisation, cyber security and data protection.
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DETAILS For more information about BSI visit: | bsi.bund.de
