Turkmenistan’s National Security Minister Yalym Berdiev briefed the President at the Cabinet session held on 6 September that of the draft law on cyber security had been designed in Turkmenistan.
The state information agency TDH reports that the law is designed to protect the national “cyber sovereignty”. The document determines the procedure and specific features of ensuring information infrastructure safety in strategically important segments.
Communications systems of all forms of ownership, which process national information resources and are used in the interests of federal and local governments, law enforcement agencies and military units, electronic management, electronic government services, e-commerce, electronic document flow as well as objects of relevant information infrastructure are subject to cyber protection.
President Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov approved the draft law and “emphasized the law was adopted in a timely manner with the view of protecting the country’s sovereignty and interests, preventing threats to network security as well as ensuring public peace and rights of organizations and citizens”.
Let us recall that in 2018 the Military Institute of Saparmurat Turkmenbashi the Great under Turkmenistan’s Ministry of Defense launched a course of study to train “cyber front fighters”.
Would-be officers and graduates of the department are expected to combat information security threats within the framework of the implementation of the state digital economy development program.
In the meantime Turkmenistan’s cyber security implies all-pervasive surveillance of online activity of its own citizens.In February 2018 President of Turkmenistan Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov met with a representative of the German company Rohde & Schwarz Hartmut Jäschke, who heads the department of cyber security solutions for government agencies, military secure communication lines as well as surveillance systems.
In January 2019 Radio “Azatlyk” reported that the equipment of this company is used for wiretapping and surveillance of online activity of Turkmen residents.