Jane Edwards
Microsoft plans to invest $20 billion in cybersecurity in the next five years and Brad Smith, the technology company’s president, said a part of that investment will be used to help federal, local and state government agencies and other enterprise customers implement the security technologies they already purchased but have not started using, CNBC reported Wednesday.
Smith told CNBC’s “Squawk Box” in an interview the lack of cyber professionals is one of the reasons behind the gap between cyber spending and better protection against hackers.
“I think we have a real shortage,” he said. “Many businesses don’t have the people that they need, either to implement the protections they, in some cases, are already paying for.”
Smith said Microsoft will spend $150 million on free engineering services over the next year to help public sector agencies “just catch up” on deploying security protection platforms they already have.
ExecutiveBiz, sister site of GovCon Wire and part of the Executive Mosaic digital media umbrella, will host a virtual event about securing the supply chain on Oct. 26. Visit ExecutiveBiz.com to sign up for the “Supply Chain Cybersecurity: Revelations and Innovations” event.
