Confidence Staveley

This talk provides a peek into a present and near future where AI is not just a defensive tool, but a powerful weapon in the hands of cybercriminals. Confidence Staveley paints a picture of an increasingly automated cyber threat landscape, where AI-driven attacks challenge the very foundations of current cybersecurity defenses.

The talk begins by exploring how AI has changed cybersecurity by enabling faster threat detection, predictive analytics, and automated responses, these same capabilities can be exploited by the bad guys as well. She uses powerful storytelling skills to detail how AI is being weaponized to conduct highly sophisticated attacks, such as AI-generated phishing campaigns that are difficult to distinguishable from legitimate communications or create malware that continuously evolves to avoid detection by traditional security tools.

A particularly thought-provoking aspect of the talk is the discussion on the potential for AI to independently find and exploit vulnerabilities in systems, evolving independently from its creators. This raises the unsettling possibility of AI-driven attacks that are a new form of digital life with its own agenda—a scenario where the hacker is not a person but an autonomous entity.

If AI becomes the hacker, traditional defense mechanisms will likely become obsolete.

How can we initiate a global conversation on cybersecurity and gender issues and bring perspectives from different stakeholders to a common platform to:

• Look at the relevance of gender disparities/inequalities in cybersecurity and define the need to focus on actionable measures to close the gender workforce and awareness gap;
• Highlight current good practices on how women are being included in cybersecurity roles across sectors;
• Discuss the various challenges faced by women as cybersecurity professionals and internet users and possible ways to address them;
• Outline the advantages of including women in the cybersecurity workforce; and
• Define what governments, civil society, and the private sector can do to make this space more diverse, inclusive, and safer.

Given the rapid growth in cyber-attacks and digital crime vis-à-vis the current acceptance of digital trading, this session will seek to answer the following questions;

How effective are our cyber security measures? How can data protection impact the digital economy? Cybercrime is one impediment to a thriving digital economy. How can professionals utilize international, regional, and private sector cooperation to address the cybercrime pandemic? How could developing countries build capacities, including skills, to use new and emerging technologies such as big data analytics and artificial intelligence to grow the digital economy?

As the world becomes more digitally connected and the drive for financial inclusion grows, the payment threat landscape has also expanded. In this session, we explore the payment threat landscape throughout the world, showcasing creative ideas for driving user-centric cybersecurity awareness campaigns and signposting predictions for the future of payments globally.

The COVID-19 pandemic has wreaked havoc on the global economy, bringing to the fore both the critical role data plays in creating growth opportunities and solving development challenges as well as the existing global data inequalities. How do we tap the full value of data, ensuring equitable access for all, including less advantaged people? What reforms are needed in data governance to protect individuals, businesses, and societies from risks or harm? Data’s transformative role in digital transformation is being debated globally.

Japan aims for a human-centered society called “Society 5.0”, where physical and cyberspace are closely integrated, and everyone can lead a comfortable, energetic, and high-quality life and the aim is also to realize this in developing countries. In addition, the value of data by free flow with trust becomes increasingly important to create innovations and new business models for the aimed society. Toward this goal, the Government of Japan through the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications (MIC) and JICA is supporting to development of the ICT infrastructure and promote utilizing digital technologies and data in African countries and other regions.

Similarly, the World Development Report 2021: Data for Better Lives explores the tremendous potential of the changing data landscape to improve the lives of less advantaged people, while also acknowledging its potential to open back doors that can harm individuals, businesses, and societies. To address this tension between the helpful and harmful potential of data, this report calls for a new social contract that enables the use and reuse of data to create economic and social value, ensures equitable access to that value, and fosters trust that data will not be misused in harmful ways. Using these three principles, the report offers an aspirational vision of an Integrated National Data System (INDS) supported by effective data governance frameworks, a way for countries to realize the full potential for data to improve lives, especially of the most vulnerable of the world.