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How Can Smart Cities Elevate Cybersecurity Efforts?

Paul Doherty discusses the challenges of cybersecurity in smart cities, emphasizing the need to balance connectivity and openness to prevent vulnerabilities. He highlights the importance of considering cybersecurity protocols in the design and architecture of smart city infrastructures. The rise in ransomware and malware attacks makes it crucial for cities to prioritize cybersecurity in their digital networks.

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By Paul Doherty · · Cyber-securityDaniel LitwinMarketscale TvPaul Doherty
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How Can Smart Cities Elevate Cybersecurity Efforts?

Key takeaways

01

Balancing connected technology and cybersecurity is critical for functional and secure smart city infrastructures.

02

It is essential to incorporate machine learning and AI to identify and mitigate cyber threats in smart cities.

03

Cities must prioritize cybersecurity in their digital projects due to the increasing prevalence of ransomware and malware attacks.

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Striking a balance on cybersecurity in smart cities is tough. It falls somewhere between implementing connected technology that is interoperable enough to be functional and not so open source that it’s open for vulnerabilities.

On this episode of MarketScale TV, live from the MarketScale Tradeshow Booth, Voice of B2B Daniel Litwin talked with Paul Doherty, President, and CEO, of the Digit Group, a smart city solution provider giving solutions on everything from master planning and architectural design services to real-world implementations of blockchain and IoT solutions.

There have been a lot of enterprise companies across many industries getting hit with new ransomware and malware attacks. Regardless, it seems, at least anecdotally, that cyber-attacks are on the rise or at least high-profile ones. When cities are building out their digital networks, it’s essential to prioritize cybersecurity, considering the recent attacks and analyzing which threats should be taken seriously.

“It’s a package that, depending on the threat, you have a certain protocol that’s part how you build it out, to begin with from an architecture and design aspect of what that stack looks like, what the APIs look like,” Doherty said. “Along with behavior change of reaction, resilience, which ultimately leads to getting out in front of the problem.”

The digital world that Doherty is referring to had to be built with different protocols in mind on where they thought the attacks were going to occur. Of course, once you do this, the attacks tend to appear somewhere else. Therefore, it’s crucial to build machine learning and AI to constantly look for those bad actors.

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About the author

PD
Paul DohertyPresident and CEO

As published by Forbes as “Changing the World”, seen on Bloomberg TV and reported by CNBC as one of America's Business Titans, Paul is a Registered Architect and one of the global Industry's most sought after thought leaders, strategists and integrators of process, technology & business. Paul is the Founder & CEO of The Digit Group, Inc. (TDG), a leading Smart Cities design, build, operate and solutions company, headquartered in Memphis, Tennessee. TDG's Smart Cities are being showcased as an example of leading design during the Venice Biennale Architettura 2021. He is an author, educator, analyst and consultant to Fortune 500 organizations, government agencies, prominent institutions and the most prestigious AEC firms in the world. Paul has spent the past 30+ years in the industry after graduating cum laude from the New York Institute of Technology and graduating from the Career Discovery program at Harvard University’s GSD.

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About the Expert

PD
Paul Doherty

President and CEO at the Digit Group

Paul Doherty is the President and CEO of the Digit Group, a company specializing in smart city solutions. He has expertise in master planning, architectural design services, and the implementation of blockchain and IoT solutions. Doherty is recognized for his work in developing cybersecurity strategies for digital networks.

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