Australian universities felt that the threat of technological aggregation is imminent, wishes to follow foreign standards in cyber-security systems.
Cyber-security limits foreign interference
Australian universities grew wary about the threats brought about by technological ignorance on some of its campuses. Universities wish to be subjected to strict regulations with regards to securing university data.
New guidelines regarding international collaboration, research partnerships, and cyber-security were discussed last Thursday. Universities are making an advance move to secure information encrypted in the university database.
The immediate call for action by university officials was triggered by the imminent threat of data breach following the series of hacks and political intimidations linked to Beijing.
New protocols push universities to strengthen their cyber-security and observe the utmost diligence in scrutinizing international partnerships on research.
Teachers and staff under the academe are reminded to be wary of sharing sensitive data when doing collaborative research and foreign partnership studies.
Statement of Education Minister Dan Tehan regarding the intensifies cyber-security protocol,
The guidelines were designed to make sure that universities understand and recognize the risks for them to defend themselves if the situation happens.
This move is just a follow from last August when Australia established a task force that will protect sensitive data from researches and special academe files.
The Government offered its sincerest help to provide intensive consultations on the risk of a data breach and stolen sensitive documents. Just last year, Australian National University was a victim of a data breach that exposed sensitive data about staff and students of the university for the past twenty years.
The threat is not true
Foreign Ministry to China, Geng Shuang, defended the allegation against China;
There is no Chinese infiltration in Australian institutions. Those speculations are pure nonsense.
Also, the foreign minister expressed;
China hopes Australia will uphold the principles of fairness, transparency, and non-discriminatory remarks. We hope that education exchange programs will be spared from political statements.
Australia clarified that all these efforts being made are just normal for institutions which are regarded to store sensitive information of high value. The new guidelines are imposed to enhance resource security and security intelligence on universities with centuries-old data.
