Shlomo Kramer: “Governments will need to increase their cybersecurity budgets”

“Governments will need to increase their cybersecurity budget to 2% of their total budget,” said Shlomo Kramer, CEO and co-founder of Cato Networks, speaking at Calcalist’s Mind the Tech London 2022 conference held on Wednesday in collaboration with Bank Leumi and LabTech.

Kramer was one of the forefathers of defensive cybersecurity, co-founding Check Point. “When we founded Check Point we did so as ideologists, but it seems that the combination of the internet with human nature requires far more supervision and regulation,” said Kramer during an interview with Calcalist’s Sophie Shulman. “Offensive cyber is an example of that. We have learned a few things in relation to that from the war between Ukraine and Russia. We are seeing a government outsource its cyber wars and that cyber can cause huge damage during a war to water and electricity infrastructures.”

What is the level of defense that a country should provide in such cases?

“That is an important issue. In a war the country defends its citizens, but in cyberspace citizens and businesses are exposed. That is something that needs to change.”

Regarding how much governments should spend on cybersecurity, Kramer used the U.S. as a benchmark. “I think that if the U.S. devotes 2% of its budget to cybersecurity other governments should do the same. I have no doubt that cyber wars are going to evolve. This is only the beginning and governments are going to have to meet this challenge.”