Fortinet strives to narrow the cybersecurity skill gap

Fortinet – a global leader in broad, integrated, and automated cybersecurity solutions – released the Asia findings of its global 2022 Cybersecurity Skills Gap Report on June 9, which reveals that the skills shortage continues to create multiple challenges for organisations in Asia, including the occurrence of security breaches and subsequently loss of money.

As a result, the skills gap remains a top concern for C-level executives and is increasingly becoming a board-level priority.

According to the ISC 2021 Cyber Workforce Report, Asia-Pacific has the largest regional workforce gap of over 1.4 million. Even though this decreased from the previous year, much still needs to be done.

Rashish Pandey, vice president of Marketing and Communications for Asia at Fortinet said, "Our Southeast Asia and Hong Kong survey shows that 71 per cent of participating companies are facing difficulty in hiring qualified talent for cybersecurity, with 63 per cent agreeing that this skill shortage results in serious consequences for their business. As more organisations adopt cloud-based technology and automation, the issues related to the lack of cybersecurity experts have been exacerbated.”

A significant challenge for organisations has been finding and retaining the right people to fill critical security roles ranging from cloud security specialists to SOC analysts. The report found that 60 per cent of leaders in Asia admit their organisation struggles with recruitment and 57 per cent struggle to retain talent.

Committed to addressing this skill gap, Fortinet's Training Advancement Agenda and Training Institute programmes were established to increase the access to and reach of its cybersecurity certifications and training, which are deemed in the survey as important for hiring organisations.

Fortinet has pledged to train 1 million professionals by 2026, and by working with local partners, has succeeded in issuing more than 840,000 certifications since the inception of the programme.

Nguyen Gia Duc, country manager, Fortinet Vietnam, said “As the landscape of cyberattacks is changing rapidly, skills need to change as well. Early this year, Fortinet signed an MoU with the Ho Chi Minh City University of Technology to provide its IT students with industry-recognised cybersecurity training.

This first academic partner establishment in Vietnam further builds on Fortinet’s existing efforts to address the cyber skills gap through training and education. We aim to build a more diverse, equitable, and inclusive cybersecurity workforce in Vietnam for the future.”