Irish Examiner view: Certainty on cyber defence is paramount

Throughout our six-month term of office, we can expect — and will get — multiple attempted breaches of our national cybersecurity systems by malign individuals and groupings trying to cause reputational and tangible damage to Ireland’s presidency and the EU as a whole.

Such is the unpredictable and multi-faceted nature of world politics at the moment, it can reasonably be expected that malevolent forces will try to take advantage of any opportunity to sow fear and to wreak havoc upon those who have failed to protect themselves against cyber threats.

So it will be during Ireland’s forthcoming presidency of the EU, which begins on July 1.

Throughout our six-month term of office, we can expect — and will get — multiple attempted breaches of our national cybersecurity systems by malign individuals and groupings trying to cause reputational and tangible damage to Ireland’s presidency and the EU as a whole.

Our security correspondent Cormac O’Keeffe has today vividly outlined the sort of threat we face as a country and as the focal element of our broader European community.

Ireland’s cyber major-domo, Richard Brown, outlined to him the startling level of such threats and also the pressing need for legislation — which is in the pipeline — to be passed before Ireland assumes the presidency.

There is no guarantee of the passage through the Dáil of those laws before the summer recess, even though the director of the National Cyber Security Centre says they are
“absolutely” needed in order for him to combat the multiple threats we will inevitably face — including from increasingly sophisticated AI models.

Such uncertainty is simply not acceptable.

With Ireland set to assume the EU’s political lead on any number of issues — ranging from the Ukraine war and the community’s ragged relationship with the Kremlin; to our ongoing and rocky ties with the US; growing trade threats from China; and the ongoing conflicts in Lebanon, Palestine, Iran, and across Africa — cyber security headaches are the last thing we need.

Our recent experience of the effects of the fuel price protesters’ blockades of critical national infrastructure gave a glimpse of the potential havoc that can be laid at our door by disruptive elements.

That we were also unable to find the source of the four military-style drones that tracked president Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s jet prior to its landing in Dublin last December is another security concern.

Ireland needs to be certain in the knowledge that everything that should be in place is in place to secure both our national interests and those of the EU for the duration of our presidency.

An underdog in fair food fight

Very few people these days are hailed as being visionary leaders with a profound commitment to the common good, human relationships, and the natural world.

Such was the case for the Italian intellectual and journalist Carlo Petrini, who passed away last week in his native town of Bra in the Piedmont region of northern Italy.

Petrini founded the Slow Food movement in 1986 in protest against the arrival of McDonald’s in Italy. Since then, he had campaigned vigorously against the growth of fast-food outlets across the globe by promoting sustainability and local cuisine.

Petrini’s was an uphill struggle in the face of corporate expansionism and greed, but it was one he embraced passionately and with considerable vigour.

He brought life to a global movement rooted in the values of good, clean, and fair food for all. In doing so, he connected farmers, communities, food artisans, cooks, activists, and reasonable people all around the world.

His passing leaves a massive void, not just in Italy, but across the whole arena of food production, science, and in the sphere of viniculture.

His constant advocacy for sustainability, the need to preserve local traditions, to enhance local culture, and create widespread respect for the environment has left a worthy legacy, with the Slow Food movement now active in 160 countries.

From handing out pasta dishes to bewildered tourists when the first McDonald’s opened near the Spanish Steps in Rome, to being a Time magazine acclaimed “European Hero”, his was a long, lauded, and hugely influential life.

Not-so-smart career move

The characteristic chaos that seems to permanently envelop the Trump administration in Washington was further highlighted by the news last weekend that Tulsi Gabbard, the US director of national intelligence, was leaving her job.

The fourth woman in high office to be shown the door by Trump since his inauguration less than two years ago, Gabbard was effectively isolated and deemed ineffective by the president as he launched unprecedented attacks on Venezuela and Iran. Although the official line is that she is resigning on June 30 next to care for her husband, who was recently diagnosed with cancer, it is widely understood she was fired.

Gabbard had testified before the US Congress that she did not believe Iran was building a nuclear weapon, but her opinion was repudiated by Trump’s decision to endorse Israeli bombing and then ordering US forces to bomb Iranian
nuclear facilities, declaring her stance as “wrong”.

Hers is a salutary lesson that simply keeping on the good side of Trump was never going to be good enough to sustain her position in government.

That she tried to initiate a prosecution against Barack Obama for a “treasonous conspiracy” to depict Russian influence on Trump’s election victory in 2016 was never going to be enough to save her bacon. She was a Democrat who left the party in 2022, but was never likely to gain the necessary level of trust needed to sustain a place in Trump’s cabinet.

She was effectively excluded from the decisions involved in the seizure of Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro in January and also in February’s decision to begin bombing in Iran.

She is not alone in being scapegoated by the administration, and neither will she be the last.

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