On 1 June 2021, Saint Petersburg Mining University hosted an international conference ‘Cybersecurity and Problems of Fighting New Types of Cybercrime’
The forum brought together professionals in the field of data protection, heads of law enforcement agencies from Russia, Germany and Israel, lecturers at the largest technical Russian universities, experts, lawyers and specialists of the banking sector.
The Conference was opened by Rector of the Mining University Vladimir Litvinenko. ‘Today, the global damage from digital scammers’ activities is $40 billion,’ the Rector claimed, ‘and it increases every year at an avalanche-like pace. However, stealing money from private bank depositors is not the worst thing. The damage from cybercriminals’ activities in the industrial and mining sectors is much more dangerous.’
President of the International Police Association Russian Section (IPA RS), Professor Yury Zhdanov noted, ‘Cybercriminals are ready to bring down the world’s traditional economy. Modern civilisation is on the verge of a global crisis. Every year, the cost of protecting information increases by 15 percent. Hacker programmes are constantly being improved, and in addition to the usual banking sector, the industrial and energy sectors of the economy become the top target for cyberattacks.’
‘This year, the damage from the cybercriminals’ activities is expected to reach six trillion roubles – this is already a very serious challenge for the country’s economy,’ Yury Zhdanov highlighted.
Stanislav Kuznetsov, Deputy Chairman of the Executive Board of Sberbank of Russia, spoke on today's most popular methods of Internet fraud and ways to combat them.
‘The number of cybercrimes has increased by 70 percent over the past year. At the moment, the second wave of Internet fraud is being recorded in Russia, which began back in 2017,’ Stanislav Kuznetsov noted.
According to him, in order to effectively solve cybercrimes, police officers need to be as advanced specialists in the IT sphere as criminals.
The Conference participants also pointed out that it is already impossible to do without proper cooperation between all interested structures in the countries belonging to a common economic market.
During the discussion, the invited experts said that only through joint efforts of law enforcement agencies, banking sector, IT specialists and government organisations could we successfully combat international cybercrime. The borders between countries should not be barriers for computer сrime fighters.