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About this session
Former Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper joins Fortis Inc. executive Gary Smith for a fireside chat introduced by GoSecure CEO Neal Creighton, covering geopolitics, cybersecurity and talent. Harper argues that technological decoupling from China was both necessary, citing his government's early moves against Huawei and ZTE, and inevitable, driven by consumer privacy concerns clashing with China's surveillance-state internet model. He says the Russia-Ukraine war confirms Western military and cyber superiority over Russia but leaves the Chinese comparison untested. On talent, he criticizes Canada's education system for ignoring labour-market needs and warns of a brain drain to the United States. On budgets, he advises security teams to quantify outcomes so their work is not the first target of cost-cutting, and tells companies not to expect government to protect them. He closes on generative AI, arguing that history's fears about disruptive technology destroying jobs have always proven wrong, and takes audience questions on foreign interference, Bill C-26 and his own past as a computer programmer.
Key takeaways
- Quantify the outcomes of your security program, not just its costs, so it is not the first thing cut when budgets tighten.
- Do not build your cybersecurity strategy on the assumption that government or telecom providers will protect you; plan as if you are on your own.
- Treat decoupling from Chinese-made networking and telecom equipment as a long-term inevitability, not a one-time compliance exercise.
- Develop written ethical standards for AI use inside your organization now, since regulation is lagging the technology's deployment.
- Factor talent retention and competitive compensation into your security planning given the ongoing brain drain of technical graduates to the United States.
Speakers
Stephen Harper
For nearly a decade The Right Honourable Stephen J. Harper led Canada through the world’s most complex geopolitical, economic and security challenges as the country’s 22nd Prime Minister. Since leaving office in 2016, Mr. Harper founded and is… Read moreRead less
For nearly a decade The Right Honourable Stephen J. Harper led Canada through the world’s most complex geopolitical, economic and security challenges as the country’s 22nd Prime Minister.
Since leaving office in 2016, Mr. Harper founded and is Chairman and CEO of Harper & Associates, a global strategic advisory firm, and the co-founder and Chairman of Vision One, a Miami-based investment fund. Mr. Harper is also the author of “Right Here, Right Now: Politics and Leadership in the Age of Disruption”, and a frequent speaker on geopolitical trends, technology, and business.
