Bangladesh moves 25 spots up in Global Cybersecurity Index

Screengrab of the cover page of the pdf version of Global Cybersecurity Index report

Bangladesh has moved up by 25 places from its previous year’s rank in the latest edition of the Global Cybersecurity Index, maintained by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), reports UNB.

With the score of 81.27 in the index for 2020, Bangladesh is positioned at 53rd, in a list containing 194 countries from across the globe.

The index is based on weighted scores for legal system, technical skills, organisational system, capacity building and mutual cooperation. It is published on ITU’s website.

Earlier, Bangladesh was ranked 78th in this index.

Scoring 100, the USA was at the highest position on the index. That may come as a surprise given the numerous high-profile hacks of American cybersecurity infrastructure that have come to light in recent months, including interruption in the supply of critical utilities.

Screengrab of a page of the pdf version of Global Cybersecurity Index report

“Several countries are outliers among least developed countries, such as Bangladesh, Benin, Rwanda, and Tanzania, which have demonstrated strong cybersecurity commitments. Notably, these countries all reported having national cybersecurity industries, a key feature of capacity development measures,” said the report.

The UK and Saudi Arabia were in second position with a score of 99.54 and Estonia is in third with a score of 99.48.

Bangladesh ranked 11th in the Asia Pacific region where Korea ranked the first scoring 97.52.

India was in the fourth position, China in seventh and Pakistan in 14th.

“This is a reflection of Bangladesh’s continued ability to provide cyber security, which will encourage us to fight cyberattacks more efficiently in the future,” said Tariq M Barkatullah, project director at BGD e-GOV CIRT, which works with the government on the country’s cyber security.