For yet another year Santander has been the cynosure of Telecommunications and Information Technologies, attracting the main ICT stakeholders to the 29th Telecommunications and Digital Economy Encounter, organized by AMETIC.

Under the slogan “Strategies for the Single Digital Market”, the 29th Encounter set itself the aim of presenting ICTs as the best empowerment device and driving force of the digital transformation, playing a key role in the country’s economic upturn and recovery of its social welfare.

The encounter, as usual, was backed by GMV, in this case with the participation of Luis Fernando Álvarez-Gascón, General Manager of GMV Secure e-Solutions, who ran through the latest trends now setting the pace in the digital transformation such as: Big Data and the Internet of Things (IoT)…, these are now being set up in sectors such as healthcare, the automobile industry, insurance or industry 4.0.

GMV is now applying groundbreaking technologies that are driving the digital transformation in a varied range of fields such as healthcare, banking and farming. In healthcare predictive analytical techniques , are now being applied for epidemiological purposes; in the banking world, fraud is being combatted with artificial intelligence technologies while farming practices are being optimized on the strength of satellite data from earth observation systems.

 

 Part of Álvarez-Gascón’s speech dealt with the crucial importance of security (“the wrongdoers have already carried out their digital transformation”) He pointed out that, in some industries, “the importance of security is being underrated.” In fact security should always be a key part of the digital transformation. There is also a pressing need for such measures as a single, coordinated, Europe-wide regulation, a bigger training effort and a public awareness-raising campaign. He also urged companies to adopt socially responsible information-system governance formulas because “our work as an industry entail a responsibility for the quality of life of the general public”.

As regards privacy, he highlighted the fact that “as a result of IoT it is now technically possible for us all to be kept under watch right round the clock… at any moment and in any place. In a democratic country like Spain it is vital to ensure government respect for human rights, privacy being one of them”. Álvarez-Gascón mentioned findings of the European Commission showing that “Half of the survey respondents doubt whether what they gain from IoT would offset the loss of privacy” and he explained that “total surveillance is not the best security strategy for protecting citizens”.

Álvarez-Gascón wound up with the following observation: “It is obvious that we are driving economic progress but it is no less obvious that our work has a knock-on effect on the quality of life of our society as a whole, and this means we have a responsibility as an industry”.

To read Luis Fernando Álvarez-Gascón’s complete lecture, please, click here.