National Cybersecurity Awareness Month 2023

The National Cybersecurity Week observation was started in the year 2021 with the objective to cultivate a cyber safe culture among the Bhutanese while living with the pandemic. It is important to ensure that every citizen of Bhutan citizen is aware and have a basic understanding on the prevalent cyberthreats. The Bhutan CIRT, Cybersecurity Division, GovTech Bhutan, proactively takes initiative to create awareness among the Bhutanese citizens on the importance of cyber hygiene. This year we will be observing the National Cybersecurity Awareness Month in October,  through the conduct of various programs and activities, with the Cybersecurity Week being one of the proposed programs.

Event Details

The following is a brief overview of the activities and programs aligned with the National Cybersecurity Awareness Month.

1. Udemy Course for all GovTech Staffs: 2nd – 6th October, 2023

Awareness month began with assigning udemy course on Basic Cybersecurity to all officials of GovTech. This was done to ensure all the employees within GovTech are aware and prepared of the various cyber threats. Udemy is made available to most of the officials and the platform is chosen as it provides self-paced learning mode.

2. Cyber safe for Children and Women by Prompt Infotech: 11th-12th October, 2023

The Cybersecurity division collaborated with the volunteers from Prompt Infotech in facilitating the conduct of the Cyber safe for Children and Women campaign to the officials of the GovTech Agency, and to the students of the Royal Thimphu College, Thimphu.

3. Capture the Flag Challenge (CTF): 16th-17th October, 2023

The first Capture the Flag challenge among the college students was conducted in 2022, supported by the Asia Pacific Telecommunity (APT)  for Young  Professionals and Student  program. This year once again APT provided support to conduct the challenge in three colleges: College of Science of Technology, Gyelposhing College of Information Technology and Jigme Namgyel Engineering College. The challenge was conducted onsite to make it more inclusive ensuring more students get the opportunity to participate in the challenge. The activities were conducted for two days. On the first day, an Introduction to the cybersecurity workshop was conducted to equip the college students with the necessary knowledge to take on the CTF challenge. On the second day, the CTF challenge prepared by the officials of the Cybersecurity Division commenced with students teaming up to solve the challenges or ‘Capture the flags’.Prizes were awarded to the winning groups from the three colleges. Three teams with two officers in each team from the Cybersecurity division were deployed to the three colleges for the event.

4. National Cybersecurity Week 2023: 23rd-27th October,2023.

The National Cybersecurity Week was conducted from the 23rd-27th October, 2023.

4.1. Cyber Hygiene Screening (Open Awareness): 23rd October, 2023

A cyber-hygiene practice survey and awareness program was conducted at five different sites in Thimphu with the support of 10 Desuups volunteers surveying the general public.

4.2. Technical Workshop: 23rd October, 2023

Mr. Warren Finch, expert from APNIC conducted a workshop on Security Onion followed by Capture the Flag Challenge exclusively for GovTech Officers.

4.3. Technical Workshop: 25th-26th October, 2023

A technical workshop consisting of two parallel tracks will be conducted  at GovTech Agency. The sessions are focused to be at Intermediate level which will help the ICT personnels in strengthening their cybersecurity postures of their agencies. The most pertinent topics of tackling domain name abuse and defending websites and networks will be covered.  Mr. Swapneel Patnekar from Shrestha IT India, who is an expert in cyber threat intel will deliver the workshop track in “Tackling domain name abuse”. The second track will be on “Web and Network Security” which will be covered by Mr. Warren Finch, APNIC.

4.4. Conference Day: 27th October, 2023

A penultimate conference will be held on October 27th, which aims to bring together all the stakeholders; to share and discuss innovative and collaborative synergies to combat cybersecurity threats within Bhutan. The conference targets a wide range of audiences from management to operational levels. Mix of local and international speakers are invited to present. The conference will include the panel discussions over “Trust in new Digital Age” focusing on the National Digital Identity and how it will shift Bhutan’s cybersecurity posture to the next level.

Agenda for the Conference Day is as follows: