How Israel balances cyber security, privacy
In an interview with Al-Monitor, cyber security specialist Major Gen. (Res.) Isaac Ben-Israel explains that security must be balanced with civilians' right to privacy, which is why the new National Cyber Bureau will be independent and not under Shin Bet control.
Despite the warnings of lawyers and experts in data security, on Feb. 15, the outgoing government authorized the creation of a national cyber defense authority. In a strongly worded letter to Attorney General Yehuda Weinstein, the opponents argued against the authorization of the program, because the agency to be created will hold many powers that could impinge on citizens’ privacy, without checks and balances.
Among the signatories of the letter are Boaz Dolev, formerly the head of Project Tehila, attorney Yoram Hacohen, the former head of the Law, Technology and Information Authority at the Ministry of Justice, and many lawyers and legal experts in the field of cyber security. According to them, the government’s proposal lacks “the creation of a civil mechanism for inspection and control over the authority’s activity — starting from periodic reports to the government and the public, to representing the objects of inspection and monitoring — in the private and business sectors — in the central decision-making processes.”
Preceding this decision was a year of fighting between the Shin Bet and the National Cyber Bureau at the prime minister’s office over the question of who will be responsible for the creation of the new agency. In the end, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu decided to leave the Shin Bet out of the picture.
Professor Isaac Ben-Israel, the head of the Interdisciplinary Cyber Research Center at Tel Aviv University and one of the leading experts in the field in Israel and the world, thinks Netanyahu’s decision was necessary and correct. While at first Ben-Israel supported the Shin Bet’s position, in the end he changed his mind and recommended to Netanyahu that he place the agency under the jurisdiction of the prime minister’s office, mainly in order to protect civic interests in privacy and data security as much as possible.
