Organizations across both public and private sectors face an increasing wave of cyber threats and a key challenge emerging is the lack of consistent information on cyberattack experiences.  

This was emphasized by the Fiji Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) Director Ron Bala in a panel discussion focused on cybersecurity and protection.  

The discussion was organized by Datec Fiji Pte Ltd in their comittment to raising awareness on cybersecurity in the country.  

During the panel, Datec Fiji Chief Executive Vinit Nand questioned the FijiCERT director on the latest details relating to cybersecurity.

Bala’s response stressed that local industry’s still hesitate to report on cyber-attack experiences to the Communication Ministry’s FijiCERT.  

“It’s very important that any organization, public, private, any organization should share information about the cyber-attacks because CERT can gather this information, put it in a central database; the same cyber-attack can happen to another organization as well.”

Bala warned that without collective reporting, national cybersecurity efforts such as the FijiCERT framework may fall short of their goals.

Though the concern is not new, but it has gained urgency as digital transformation accelerates and without shared knowledge of attack patterns and vulnerabilities, threats can spread unchecked and breach in one sector could easily reappear in another, costing time, data, and public trust.

Therefore FijiCERT calls for cooperation encouraging all organizations to adopt relevant cybersecurity standards tailored to their operational needs, but adoption alone is not enough as frameworks are only effective if there is transparency as information must flow.

“And I would like to go back to the framework. It’s very important. Framework is the foundation for cyber security. It’s already, someone already developed this framework. It’s us, make use of it. It will secure the organization from non-cyber threat as well. And also how to handle the cyber threat.”

While some private companies hesitate to disclose incidents due to reputational or legal concerns, Bala says that the benefits of shared intelligence far outweigh the risks and a collective defense model where incidents are reported, analyzed, and addressed centrally could significantly reduce exposure for everyone.

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