Cheryl Biswas
Cheryl Biswas is a Canadian cybersecurity analyst engaged in strategic threat intelligence, tracking trends and emerging threats, and helping defend critical infrastructure. Her work experience across various sectors includes KPMG, CP Rail and TD Bank. She actively engages in the security community as a presenter, podcast contributor, volunteer, and mentor. She helped found “The Diana Initiative” and champions women and diversity in cybersecurity. She loves to ask “What if …”
Session
When you hear national sovereignty, do you think cybersecurity? Canada’s Arctic could be described as “the world’s most digitally vulnerable frontier”. This vast expanse of land is a highly coveted target, resource rich and strategically valuable for the Northwest Passage, a sea route between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans over which Canada has claimed sovereignty. But sparse population, limited critical infrastructure and aging defences leave it vulnerable. Canada relies heavily on its partnership with the US for military monitoring and defence in the region through NORAD. Surveillance is essential, but satellites, networks, radar, and ships can be targeted and compromised. As polar ice melts, Russian and Chinese vessels increasingly access the shipping routes. The US President has asserted the need to own Greenland, and boldly declared that Canada should be the 51st state. In a strategic course change of self-assertion, Canada is now committing tremendous resources to defence, technology and infrastructure. But does this address the risks to national sovereignty via our northern exposure and the cyberthreats we face with advanced technology? As Canada seeks to forge new alliances externally, and build its leadership capabilities among middle powers, securing our Arctic sovereignty against cyber threats is essential to guiding our way in a new world order.