The following are the outputs of the captioning taken during an IGF virtual intervention. Although it is largely accurate, in some cases it may be incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors. It is posted as an aid, but should not be treated as an authoritative record.
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>> IZABELA ALBRYCHT: Good morning, good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen.
Good afternoon.
Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Do you hear me well? No, you don't hear me well.
Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen.
Welcome to the session Cyber Secure Cities of the Future organized by the ‑‑
One more try.
Okay. I'm sorry for this disruption.
One more time.
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the panel discussion entitled: Cyber Secure Cities of the Future (Ministry of Development Funds and Regional Policy, Poland).
My name is Izabela Albrycht. I'm the chair of the CYBERSEC forum.
Also for the council for the Digitization and the prime minister of Poland as well as the executive board for the emerging group of technologies in NATO.
The topic we'll be discussing today has so many dimensions.
I am really glad I can moderate this panel discussion.
I would like to welcome my panelist. The majority of them is on site. Thanks to the Internet, somewhere joining from other parts of the world, and they can join us online.
Welcome to the stage, Ms. Maigorzata Jarosinska‑Jedynak, Secretary of State in the development of funds and policy.
Overseeing the implementation of the European Social Fund and the implementation of the Accessibility Plus Program. She is also involved with the forum in Katowice in 2022.
Previously, she was the minister of development of funds and General Policy.
Welcome. Katowice Katowice City Secretary, Maciej Stachura. He's involved with the youth program.
Kamil Wyszkowski, Executive Director of UN Compact Network Poland implementing the UN development goals and standards.
Mr. Andrew Roberts, cybersecurity specialist, smart city Center of Excellence, Tallinn University of Technology.
Katarzyna Smetek, she works with with the Youth Council of the World Urban Forum 11.
Shipra Narang Suri is here with the Urban Practices Branch of UN‑Habitat.
And Evangelos Ouzounis, head of the policy development and Implementation Unit for the European Union agent For Cybersecurity. They lead in the information cybersecurity directive.
Ladies and gentlemen, panel discussion is organized in the hybrid format, which means that you can also join us remotely with Zoom.
In the first part of the discussion, we'll concentrate on the perspective of public policymakers. The discussion will focus on the issues such as how do we develop digitization in a way that ensures the common good and includes the values such as inclusion, human‑centric approach, and transparency as well as cybersecurity.
In the second part of the discussion, we will dive deep into the perspective of cities and youth. We know that the generation of today's teenager will grow old. How do we build cities to make sure they will be secure in digital threats of tomorrow and how do we make sure the cities meet the digitalization of the youth dreams.
Ladies and gentlemen, we live in the time of the digital revolution. We most remain active participants. Technology changes our lives. Innovative solutions transform overnight into everyday objects. Without that, we cannot imagine our existence anymore.
This has developed assistance pandemic broke out. With the digital change, a new shift to a new type of economy is also taking shape before our eyes.
Digital technologies are used by enterprise and public institutions, NGOs, workers, customers, and citizens. The method of production and consumption, the organization and structure of the market, the nature of work, as well as basic functions of the state and the way in which they are implemented are changing.
We can observe a disruption between society and technology. Technology is taking over, and we need to manage for good.
Digital technologies do not exist in emptiness. They have an enormous potential for positive change, but they can also strengthen and enlarge the existing issues and worsen the economic, social, and other inequalities.
The Secretary‑General report, a Roadmap for Digital Cooperation (?) there's digitally augmented work that is vulnerable and insecure.
There's also the ecological dimension. So how do we embed the values we believe in: Democracy, privacy, rule of law into the private world. This is the world we're now creating.
Digital revolution will certainly affect the way cities are managed and, thus, the lives of billions of people.
New smart cities of the future will be planned and built using the possibilities of AI, other modern technologies, and completely new materials. And our role is to ensure that digital transformation is fair, sustainable, and non‑exclusive so not as to contribute to further degradation of nature and life quality in real life.
Also, it is on us to make it secure in terms of ICT layer (?) swear and hardware privacy layer. We need to make sure that smart cities will not lead to gradual erosion of privacy.
We have it in the declaration which was kicked off today in the morning by think tank coalition led by (?) Institute and together with young leaders from this organizations who will make sure to implement safety measures here.
In a view of the current and growing challenges faced by cities in Europe and around the world, it is necessary to strengthen the capacity of cities to plan and respond to different types of crisis, including cyber and weaponization of cities in the modern warfare. Cities must develop to changing development conditions, plan ahead, constantly evolve, and be ready for unpredictable phenomena and events.
The secretary consideration should go across the whole technology infrastructure of the ecosystem with the three layers, the edge, the communication, the core channel. Smart cities should implement the confidentiality integrated availability but also safety and resiliency of integrated IT and OT systems.
Ladies and gentlemen, next year, in June 2022, Poland will be hosting the 11th session of the World Urban Forum under the slogan transforming our urban cities for a better future.
Poland has a unique history of urban transformation to show which may become an inspiration for other urban centers in the world.
We strongly believe that the Polish experiences of economic transformation carried out with respect for environmental and social issues can become an important voice in the discussion on the future of cities.
Before we jump into the discussion, I would like to invite you to watch a premier of the (?) for the Urban Forum promotional film.
(Video playing)
>> IZABELA ALBRYCHT: All right. Ladies and gentlemen, let's jump into the discussion with the first question to madam Minister, according to the slogan of the next year's Urban Forum, cities are to be greener, smarter, and more resilient to more crisis and threats, including digital threats.
A smart city is also synonymous with an accessible city. Access to public space needs to be equal to everyone. How do smart city solutions effect the availability of public goods and service for resistance?
>> Thank you very much for that question, Dear Madam, speakers, guests.
First of all, I would like to thank you for participating in this debate because the ministry of Development Funds which I represent as organizer of today's panel.
So the topic of the role of modern transformation and technologies in urban development and the issue of digital threats is very important, especially in times of pandemic where access to digital services is so much necessary.
This issue will also be discussed among many others, of course, during the 11th session of the World Urban Forum hosted by Poland together with UN‑Habitat in June next year, in the same place, in Katowice.
In the times of climate change and growing disproportions between the richest and poorest, comprehensive and innovative of cities, especially in their social dimension is undoubtedly a trend both in Europe and around the world.
The concept of smart cities is often mistakenly reduced only to equipping the city with modern technological solution without campaigning intelligent atmospheres.
Smart cities accompanied by economic security and managed by local governments, they're becoming more and more aware of the idea of smart cities, and they see they need to implement intelligent solutions.
For city alternatives, the solutions such as intelligent transmission networks or smart solutions in the field of urban mobility are poor saving.
The same is true for residents who can live in cleaner and greener cities.
Social dimensions of smart city is of particular importance.
It enables local governments to implement projects based on a new, innovative technologies and related to, for instance, social housing innovations, economy, or social work participation.
A smart city is a label to all of its users. Such activities are worth supported. However, the pandemic revealed to the shortcomings of cities in terms of accessibility for people with disabilities. An accessibility city, smart city, should be ready to use to the potential of all its inhabitants.
People with disabilities or elderly also are employees, clients, customers, or tourists.
They were offered a chance for better, more efficient, and often independent functioning in everyday life. So I'm convinced that none of us has adapted the idea of smart city is not only temporary passion and catchy slogan but also means real solutions that bring savings, improve the quality and efficiency of city management, and the satisfaction of residents.
Ladies and gentlemen, during the 11th session of the World Urban Forum in Katowice, we want the issue of smart city to be strongly emphasized.
I'm sure that in June, next year, in Katowice, during the World Urban Forum Expo, we will see interesting technological solutions increasing the smartness of cities.
Thank you very much.
>> IZABELA ALBRYCHT: Thank you. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for the access of the forum.
>> You should.
>> IZABELA ALBRYCHT: (Chuckling). There's a role in the digital cities revolution.
Our next question will go to Mr. Maciej Stachura.
>> MACIEJ STACHURA: As a representative, I can say we're proud to host IGF. In some way, it may be the answer to your question. In the smart city fields, you have to be active. So we share our experiences with other cities from all over the world. We try to learn from the best, and we also want to show what we have achieved in Katowice, for instance, IGF or World Urban Forum, as the Minister mentioned, it's a great platform to exchange experiences.
As you know, we're the capital of 2 million people in Polish cities. We're leading in terms of smart solutions, but we are unsatisfied. Yes? We want more every day. We want to change. We want to achieve more and more. Our goal is to implement smart solutions in as many areas as we can.
When you are governing a town, a city, you cannot implement smart solutions in only one or two fields because in the nearest future, you won't be competitive, especially in the terms of attracting new investors or new inhabitants.
You asked about challenges. I see who biggest challenges. First is obvious. It's money. Yes? You can always borrow money. So you can find money, but the point is to change thinking about money.
You have to start thinking about money in terms of new technologies like investing money, not spending money. Yes? Because when you invest money in smart solutions, you are going to gain from it, for instance, by reducing costs.
The second challenge, I think it's most important because, as a city, we are not a private company in terms of spending public money. Every time we spend money in the field of new technologies, our citizens are asking: Why are you doing this? What are we going to benefit from it? Yes?
With each new project, we have to ensure our citizens that it will be good for them and bring some benefits for them.
When the new technology succeeds, you know, it's fine, yes? Everyone is happy.
As we know, sometimes solutions fail. We have to face public opinion sometimes. We also face accusations of losing public money. I ask this because we cannot be afraid.
We have to persuade our citizens that sometimes we can make mistakes, that sometimes new and ambitious projects can fail, yes? It's very important because, as you know, sometimes it's not easy to deal with public opinion, but we have to win people, yes, to make some changes.
So it's important to remember about it.
And you also asked about some example of smart solutions in Katowice. So I would say a few words about safety.
We implemented KISMIA. Today, it collects data from almost 300 cameras. Thanks to artificial‑intelligence solutions, it detects things like car collisions, street fights, like people lying on the ground. It also recognizes cars by the registration numbers.
When the system detects a dangerous situation, it displays it on the screen, and city operators can make a decision what to do about it. For instance, in this way, we don't need to employ 20 people to observe 300 cameras. We just need two or three of them.
This shows us to manage resources widely. Every city in the whole world, everyone wants more resources, more money, more tools. Yes? Many
With smart technologies, you manage resources you have wisely.
Every year, we add cameras, and the crime rate has dropped. We have to show effect to our citizens.
We were prompted to develop better system. It would be called Kismia 2.0. The new system would collect much more data.
Thanks to big data, yes, we would be able to react in certain situations and predict them.
To sum it up, living in a city means living in smart solutions. It's not a question whether we want to implement it. It's a question how fast should we do it.
Thank you.
>> IZABELA ALBRYCHT: Thank you very much. I would paraphrase with that and say with great (?) comes great responsibility.
I would like to ask Shipra ‑‑
>> SHIPRA NARANG SURI: Yes.
>> IZABELA ALBRYCHT: Regarding urban development which we're witnessing now, it will only accelerate.
>> SHIPRA NARANG SURI: Thank you very much, moderator.
Thank you, Minister. It's great to see you again.
Colleagues from Katowice.
It's really my honor to be here.
As you know, I come from UN‑Habitat. For us, really, the whole smart city discourse is about putting people in the center. It's very, very important.
I think the three or four generations of the smart city paradigm that have come in, we're really coming and talking about putting people at the center. We know there's a potential to serve people.
We've seen in the last couple of years that digital divides remain around the world. The digital resolution must be directed and governed in a transparent way.
Human rights must be at the heart of it and the outcome.
We know that COVID has shown us that unequally applied and unequally accessible digital technologies can actually do more damage than they can have benefits.
They can reinforce spatial and social economic differences. A child with access to education over the Internet has access to remote learning, is in a very different place from a child who does not, who does not even own a device or cannot access education or health care without being physically present.
Digital, half of the world is still not connected digitally. That's one part of the story.
On a second part for us, it's very, very important that we talk about ‑‑ as I said, we center the whole smart city discourse around people. We make access to technology accessible. We manage data infrastructure. We build trust by securing digital assets. And then we build multistakeholder capacity.
This is extremely important for us when you talk about cybersecurity and leveraging cybersecurity. Indeed, AI has many, many applications, predicting disasters, crisis, air‑quality challenges, the next flood, the next heat wave, and allowing people to prepare for it.
But enabled employing also has very, very serious challenges. We have seen that happen. It presents very serious human rights risks. It's not about doing it or not. It's about how fast we do it. I think it's about how fast we put safeguards to apply a data‑driven approach in this manner.
AI can have disastrous effects if they're used without regard to human rights. I think it's important that we use technology but we use it in a way that is just, that is fair, that is transparent, that does not exacerbate digital divides and does not exacerbate the potential for violation of human rights. That, to us, is absolutely fundamental in this discussion around transforming cities around a digital or smart city‑based approach.
>> IZABELA ALBRYCHT: You attached the crisis point.
There's a management of resources and more effective management of information and increases security in the face of crisis situations, helping in the crisis management. This is in accordance with the implementation of sustaining developmental goals.
How do you ‑‑
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>> SHIPRA NARANG SURI: Cities are using data of many cities, including crowd‑source data, big data, we're hoping smart city is something we'll bring to the World Urban Forum in Katowice.
Cities are using data to the voluntary local reviews. They're using the opportunities that are presented in the international forum to report on their sustainability developmental goals and the progress toward sustainability developmental goals.
We're using cities around the world and Katowice to predict climate change and prepare for those. They're also using data to enhance the safety and security of public spaces, for example, or a transport infrastructure. We just heard around road accidents. So there are those students to enhance their policymaking.
I think there are two things here that are very important. First, that local governments, cities don't think of themselves as technology organizations. But the amount of data they're managing, they need to starting managing themselves as tech providers and put in place the security measures that are needed to protect the technological system and share and maintain large data and security.
That's very important. I think that should definitely make its way into the discussion in the World Urban Forum and to the follow‑up from the Katowice Forum.
All of today's networks are constantly being probed for vulnerabilities and weaknesses. Local governments also have a responsibility to make sure that their networks are secure and that their data is secure. That's very important.
I would put that as a key element, really, in terms of building resilience and in terms of dealing with the data and cybersecurity issues.
>> IZABELA ALBRYCHT: Thank you so much.
With that, I would like to turn to Mr. Kamil Wyszkowski to talk about the topic of artificial intelligence.
So how can artificial intelligence and technology reduce the energy intensity of the city in the context of climate, which was also mentioned previously. Predictions, it says that cities that leverage smart city solutions can improve their efficiency by 30% in 20 years.
>> KAMIL WYSZKOWSKI: The U.S. economy is based on not only coal but also oil. What we have in the United States, we have a Climate Industrial Revolution, definitely. It's to move from where the U.S. is now into the new model. Under the new model, we should have, in the U.S., 40% of energy from wind, around 35% from solar, 11 to 13% from nuclear energy, and the rest from traditional sources.
The U.S. Government is including into data artificial intelligence as an important factor. Most of the cities are planning to implement technology to be able to save as much as possible of energy which, simply, they are consuming.
How many cities are consuming? Extremely high level, around 80%. When we're comparing to the rest of the world, just to remind everybody, we have 50% population of cities, and 3% are covering land (?) this country is so well developed. In American cities, people laugh to consume large amounts of energy.
In Europe, when compared, it's better. It's around 70%. In Africa, we have wonderful data from international agency. Cities are below 60%. Of course, everywhere, intelligence could be helpful. If we're able to implement what we already have, as you mentioned, we'll have 30% of reduction in addition to that.
It's also good to discuss later, it's useful, but we have global threats. This or that city could be attacked from the outside world, simply, and paralyzed if their systems, especially based on artificial intelligence, are not well protected.
So, of course, we have pluses and a lot of minuses, especially when we're taking into account some global threats related to the new models of work, which we, of course, are observing around us.
>> IZABELA ALBRYCHT: Excellent.
Thank you. The cybersecurity topic was mentioned two times today, or even three.
So I will start a round of the cybersecurity questions with a question to Mr. Evangelos Ouzounis.
Sir, are you here with us online?
>> EVANGELOS OUZOUNIS: Yes, I am. Good afternoon.
>> IZABELA ALBRYCHT: Good afternoon. What are the cybersecurity threats related to smart cities?
One was mention ed. We know they are sophisticated.
>> EVANGELOS OUZOUNIS: Apologies I couldn't make it to Katowice. It's a great city. Maybe next time.
So I would agree with the Minister and the representative from the city of Katowice that this is definitely an investment and not a cost. By investing in new technologies, your open up the Pandora box related to cybersecurity and threats.
Also, you have to consider how these investments are going to play out with existing legacy applications, which are numerous in a big city. Integrating old technologies with new technologies and offering valued services.
Cybersecurity is definitely going to affect all of us, especially in big cities of millions of citizens, it can be a big disaster. It affects, you know, the way that we go to work, the way that we ‑‑ the mass media operates, the traffic lights, and other important systems.
So I will say that there are a couple of important things to do. Definitely one thing is to accept that you are vulnerable, and you have to develop a plan to mitigate crisis.
I will advise cities to develop a strategy, a cybersecurity strategy that will help them to develop or appropriate the skills, to appropriate strategies, to appropriate mechanisms.
The second thing I will recommend is to do a proper risk assessment to identify where the possible threats, where the possible risks might pop up when they embark into this important journey.
By doing a proper risk assessment, they can already prioritize what needs to be done today, tomorrow, or in the coming, you know, years. It is important to assume that one day you are going to be affected, and you have to have the appropriate capability to respond to a crisis.
What we recommend to member states, I will also recommend this to the city, to have an incident response team, a team that's able to respond to a crisis to deal with something like an emergency.
Most of the systems, you have to collaborate with them, and you need a legal framework to do that. At the national level or regional level, there's this corporation both at the legal level but also at the trust level. So these players have to know each other. They need to meet regularly. They need to share information and understand each other so they know how to act during a crisis. Sometimes we fail because we spend a lot of time trying to understand who is who and who does what.
Closing, I would say that we will have to pay attention to legacy systems. A lot of systems may be very old. By bringing the systems online, we expose ourselves to important vulnerabilities. These old systems have not been developed with cybersecurity in mind. They are not very protected. The technologies they use are not Internet‑based. If you bring them into a challenging environment like the Internet, they are very, very vulnerable. So you have to pay attention to this cyberphysical phenomenon, how these attacks can lead to disaster, I can tell you it's not easy. You cannot find a lot of experts. If you find these experts, maybe a city might not have the money to enroll them because they are so expensive. So you have to play with a lack of skills, with a lack of balance available because of the huge demand that exists in the moment in this field.
I don't want to be exhaustive in my contribution, knowing that others would like to take the talking and the speech.
I will close and say that we cannot proceed in a smart city without having a proper cybersecurity plan or a system or a strategy in place.
Thank you, and back to you, moderator.
>> IZABELA ALBRYCHT: Thank you.
In terms of those strategies, I would like to come back to the Minister. We spoke about the public goods and services, they should be available for all time. They need to be cybersecure. We've witnessed cyberattacks on local cities in Poland.
Following the recommendation of Mr. Ouzounis.
>> It's one of the challenges for the cities in the future. It also results from social expectation because improvement of living condition, speed, and ease of dealing with administrative matters. The COVID pandemic has shown that access to services without leaving home is very important to us.
So the importance of urban development has been emphasized in National Urban Policy, a strategy that is currently being updated in Poland. Digitalization, as a trend effects all dimensions of sustainable urban development, therefore, it should be carried out to ensure the common goods on the basis of values such as social inclusion, focus on people and transparency. The National Urban Policy impressive the level of digitalization of local governments. It's necessary to create good conditions for digitalization of local governments in particular order, a need for stability, greater clarity, and simplification of legal obligation.
We also pay attention to opening for public data in order to increase the participation of citizens in code deciding on public efforts activities, activities in this area should focus on improving the quality of collected and shared public data and on ensuring their safe storage.
Together with the development of digital confidences of city, I think IT security must be ensured. In this aspect, it's necessary to unify the approach to cybersecurity at the national level.
In 2018, the act on the national security ‑‑ National Cybersecurity System entered into force which implements into the Polish legal system the network and information system direct. It was the first in the field of cybersecurity. We also developed cybersecurity strategy of the Republic of Poland for 2019 to 2024.
Thank you very much.
>> IZABELA ALBRYCHT: Thank you very much.
Would you like to share regarding the right level of security? Probably one minute.
>> EVANGELOS OUZOUNIS: Let me come back to a report from 2015. We got a lot of recommendations that certain cities should be much more better in protecting their critical infrastructure. Here, the progress is very, very small.
>> KAMIL WYSZKOWSKI: The protected water destruction system, the traffic lights, the distribution of heat, the important elements of proper cooperation between cities when one city will be heated by cyberattacks. That thing still should be solved.
Here, by the way, the government is acting very actively, so we have a new strategy implemented by the government of Poland last year together with 12 other European countries where the European Institution applied a positive level.
Coming back here to the institutions, they are providing very sensitive data when we're talking about the health sector, for instance. All this data should be properly protected. And, again, here the system is not effective and transparent enough.
Let's take a concrete example. When we're going to the dentist, if this private company is protecting your data properly, especially when you're providing very sensitive information that you're, for instance, HIV positive? Of course not. That's a problem. This is an example between the public sector and private sector. It's very well showing how important is that aspect and how many things we need to address here also in the context of old enough control from National Chamber of Control in Poland from 2015. It's really good to come back to this paper and to take a look seriously on the recommendations.
>> IZABELA ALBRYCHT: Thank you for your contribution.
So let's move to the second part of the discussion with the first question to Mr. Roberts. The COVID pandemic introduced an even greater urgency for local and national governments that would like to bridge the growing digital divide, especially for marginalized groups. How should local and the government administration build more efficient and secure data management systems, which we mentioned already, and protect citizens' privacy when using digital services? These activities are the foundation for inclusive and resilient, smart cities.
Over to you and the Estonian experience.
>> Andrew Roberts: The governments needed to secure a digital solution to understand the health outcome of citizens to make predictions. We saw the procurement that needed privacy by engineering, design, and fundamental principles of security engineering, security by design.
For instance, in the Estonian case, the consortium was a partnership of digital partnerships. There was a partner that had long experience with privacy engineering and development of cryptographic solutions.
Our COVID ‑‑
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>> ‑‑ it's not just about teaching the young kids how to use the computer but teaching them safe on how to use the Internet.
>> KAMIL WYSZKOWSKI: We had 4.9 billion people offline and 40% of global population is without any access to Internet, that's something we have to solve.
>> Taking into account currently the youth population is the biggest one in history. So more than 50% of the people in the world are youth. So how do we make this divide smaller and smaller and make this transition even faster?
>> IZABELA ALBRYCHT: Thank you. With this short spoiler, I would say, toward the World Urban Forum, I would like to ask Madam Minister to invite our guests to the next exhibition.
>> MAIGORZATA JAROSINSKA‑JEDYNAK: I would like to thank you for taking part and invite you to take part at the World Urban Forum in June here next year, in the same place, in Katowice. I hope we will see in Katowice from 26th to the 30th of June in 2022.
See you in Katowice.
>> IZABELA ALBRYCHT: Thank you very much to my panelists here on site and online.
Ladies and gentlemen, we need to have people join our digital revolution which should be made as inclusive as possible and secure in the value chain, to not ask ourselves if this is really the new world we have created.
So with that, thank you very much. Have a great rest of the day in Katowice.
Thank you.