While in 2021 alone one in two companies was the victim of a computer attack, and nearly one in two SMEs went bankrupt in the 18 months following an attack, the Minister Delegate for the Digital Transition and Telecommunications, Jean-Noël Barrot, announced the opening of an envelope of 30 million euros. The objective: to help small and medium-sized enterprises, but also local authorities and individuals, to protect themselves from hackers.
To ensure the proper IT defense of small and medium-sized enterprises, the Minister for the Digital Transition and Telecommunications communicated, within the framework of the European Cyber Week which is held in Rennes until Thursday, on the implementation of a “cyber shield” endowed with 30 million euros. Thus, 750 companies belonging to strategic sectors will be offered, during the year 2023, aid in the fields of auditing, consulting and training. “We want to strengthen these SMEs-ETIs because they are too small to have cyber experts in-house and can represent a weak link during an attack, and contaminate their stakeholders, customers or suppliers”, explained the Minister. .
Concretely, a free self-diagnosis tool will be available. It will be used to verify that the protections of a company and its suppliers are effective, through questions such as: “Is your web access software really up to date?” or “is your password strong?”. Above all, the government wants to help companies newly affected by the European directive NIS2, which increases the number of companies to which the European Union asks, under pain of a fine, to ensure sufficient security of their networks. This directive, adopted in 2016, previously concerned companies in critical sectors, such as banking, health and energy. Soon, companies linked to food distribution, postal services and waste management will be included.
According to Sofaxis, the national union of general managers of local authorities, 42% of cyberattacks target local authorities, while only 4% of the budget of these same local authorities is allocated to securing their computer system. To remedy this situation, Jean-Noël Barrot announced that 125 communities would benefit from reinforced routes, while 50 new ones would enter the security assistance system. These defense courses against cyberattacks were created in 2021, with a dedicated envelope of 136 million euros. Small towns are not left out either, since they are a prime target for hackers. During the year 2023, they will be able to subscribe to a system providing them with secure digital hosting.
Another part of the envelope is intended for public bodies, which are subject to regular attacks, as shown by the example of the Corbeil-Essonnes hospital, from which hackers stole 11.7 gigabytes of data last September. health. The government is therefore accelerating on the smooth running of the plan announced a year and a half ago, which aimed to secure 950 establishments.
For the general public, the government will offer an “anti-scam filter”, downloadable on their browser and smartphone, used to preventatively filter internet addresses associated with malicious sites. Also, at the end of October, the Minister for the Digital Transition and Telecommunications announced the launch of a “cyberscore”, the objective of which is to rate the level of security of the sites that users visit. The objective is that individuals have its tools before the Olympic Games organized in Paris in 2024. A period when the number of cyberattacks could be significant.
