Chile will have the first national cybersecurity agency in Latin America

Chili As of this Tuesday, it has its first cybersecurity law, which creates a pioneering national agency in Latin America and that will allow fines of more than US$ 2.6 million.

“We will be able to better prevent and confront very specific cases such as identity theft, sending viruses, service outages, sabotage and spam,” said President Gabriel Boric during the promulgation of the so-called Cybersecurity Framework Law.

Thanks to the law, the president added, “Chile becomes the first country in Latin America and the Caribbean to have a National Cybersecurity Agency (ANCI) and a cutting-edge regulatory framework.”

The bill was presented at the end of the second term of former conservative president Sebastián Piñera (2018-2022) and received transversal support in both Chambers.

“It has been possible for projects started in one administration to be continued in the other, agreements have been achieved despite the fact that there are differences (…) That speaks of a way of acting that I hope will infect many other matters,” For her part, the Minister of the Interior, Carolina Tohá, indicated that she thanked several opposition parliamentarians who contributed to processing the law and attended the promulgation.

The law regulates and requires the application of specific measures to prevent cybersecurity incidents other than public and private services, telecommunications, digital services, health services, and financial and messaging services, among others.

According to the United Nations, there is a computer attack in the world every 39 seconds.

In Latin America, Brazil, Mexico, Colombia and Peru are the countries in the region that suffered the highest number of malware attacks during 2023.

According to the latest data from National Cyber ​​Security (NCSI), Chile dropped 10 positions in the cybersecurity index, from 46th to 56th place, positioning itself below Paraguay, Argentina and Peru.

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