Serhiy Demedyuk discusses with the Japanese delegation the deepening of Ukrainian-Japanese cybersecurity cooperation
Deputy Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine Serhiy Demedyuk met with the Japanese delegation chaired by Deputy Head of the Japanese Mission to NATO Hidetoshi Ogawa. Deputy Head of Mission at the Embassy of Japan in Ukraine Kazuya Otsuka and Head of Political Section at the Embassy of Japan in Ukraine Daisuke Minamino attended the delegation.
Deputy Head of the Japanese Mission to NATO Hidetoshi Ogawa. The delegation also included Kazuya Otsuka, Deputy Head of Mission of the Embassy of Japan in Ukraine, and Daisuke Minamino, Head of the Political Department of the Embassy of Japan in Ukraine.
The meeting took place in the framework of deepening cooperation between the cybersecurity agencies of the two countries.
During the meeting, Head of the National Coordination Center for Cybersecurity at the NSDC of Ukraine Serhiy Prokopenko acquainted the Japanese side with the Center’s capabilities and spoke about its achievements in recent years.
According to him, at the initiative of the President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the NCCC’s capabilities were significantly strengthened. “If previously, since 2016, it was mostly a political body, now the Center has become a key platform for practical cooperation between the main cybersecurity actors and the private sector”, - Mr. Prokopenko said adding that the Center carries out round-the-clock monitoring, information exchange and prompt response to cyber incidents.
Mr. Demedyuk underscored that the Center also has powerful tools for forecasting the situation in cyberspace, which contributes to effective decision-making. “During the war with Russia, we learned to detect trends of escalating aggression in cyberspace – for example, the fact that Russian cyberattacks are often accompanied by information operations and covert intelligence”, - he said.
According to the Deputy NSDC Secretary, an important component of the NCCC’s activities is the development of practical cooperation with international partners, and Ukraine is grateful to Japan for the support of our state in this direction.
Mr. Demedyuk noted that in March this year, Secretary of the NSDC of Ukraine Oleksiy Danilov held a telephone consultation with Secretary General of the National Security Council of Japan Shigeru Kitamura. As a result of talks, a memorandum of cooperation between the National Coordination Center for Cybersecurity at the NSDC of Ukraine and the National Center of Incident Readiness and Strategy for Cybersecurity of Japan was signed.
In this context, he expressed the conviction about the need to exchange information on vulnerabilities in cyberspace between Ukraine and Japan.
The Deputy NSDC Secretary also noticed that Ukraine had recently submitted a formal application for membership in the NATO Cooperative Cyber Defense Centre of Excellence (CCDCOE). Mr. Demedyuk asked the Japanese side, as a member of CCDCOE, to assist in considering the application.
Separately, the parties touched upon the issue of the joint NATO-Ukraine Tabletop Exercise “Coherent Resilience” on countering hybrid threats to critical infrastructure in the Black Sea region, which will be held by the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine in Odesa next week.
In turn, Hidetoshi Ogawa acknowledged Ukraine’s achievements in developing the cybersecurity system and expressed readiness to further deepen practical cooperation between our countries. Mr. Ogawa also assured of the readiness to support Ukraine on international platforms.