- Carlos San Juan, known for the initiative “I am a senior citizen, not an idiot”, will share at CSI Radar in Seville how older people perceive cybersecurity.
- For Carlos San Juan, “people who live alone are closed to digitalization because they are afraid”.
- The International Cybersecurity Radar (CSI Radar) will be held from June 12 to 16 in Seville, with two face-to-face and two virtual sessions.
Carlos San Juan has become an emblem of the struggle for the financial integration of senior citizens thanks to his initiative “I am a senior citizen, not an idiot”. This retired physician managed to collect more than 600,000 signatures demanding humane treatment at bank branches. San Juan will be a speaker at the first edition of CSI Radar, the International Cybersecurity Radar (June 12-16, Seville), where he will talk about one of the issues that most concerns senior citizens: cybersecurity.
“Unprotected in the face of a cyberattack”.
Carlos San Juan reveals that “there is a lot of fear” among the elderly towards the digital. And there are many cases in which the elderly have suffered the consequences of this lack of protection. “Recently, a man had his card pin copied at a cash machine and 800 euros were taken from him”.
Carlos San Juan has also experienced these attempts firsthand: “I receive messages every day pretending to be from my bank, although we no longer bite, but we feel vulnerable. I asked a question: Why is it that in a case of hacking, the damaged customer is not backed by bank insurance? It strikes me that we are unprotected in the event of a cyberattack,” says San Juan.
Although there are many elderly people who “are not at risk because they do not have access” to new technologies, “those of us who are willing to learn feel unprotected“.
Faced with this situation, Carlos San Juan proposes the following: “We must have well-designed applications and insurance to protect our economy or vulnerability, in the same way that we have protected other aspects of our lives”.
He considers that “there are people who live alone and when they hear all this, they are closed to digitalization because they are afraid, especially even of ATMs”. A very important detail for him is the issue of legislation. “It will have to be changed. The big hackers when they have served a testimonial sentence, in my opinion, then go to work in large companies and do so as a protector against hackers. I think this even encourages hackers. There should be a deterrent point of view.”
Bullying on the Internet, one of the biggest problems
As Carlos San Juan states, “When you want to install Internet protection, the prices are enormous and they can also be forced and security is not 100% absolute“. However, one of the problems that San Juan would like to focus on the most is bullying on the Internet. “It scares me for my granddaughters as well. They should invest heavily in shielding and make it more affordable. I personally am very suspicious and anxious that anything I do might invade my privacy or that I might even be being robbed.”
‘CSI Radar‘ (Cyber Security International Radar) was created with the aim of giving visibility to all the leading companies and multinationals, as well as universities, institutions, manufacturers and experts who are working to improve cybersecurity in companies and public administrations in Spain and around the world. The agenda is already available on the official website.
All CSI Radar conferences can be followed on ‘El Observatorio‘, a platform launched by Medina Media Events, a company specialized in the organization of top international “boutique events” such as the 5G Forum, SUTUSummit (space and underwater tourism) and the 4K HDR Summit.
This first edition of CSI Radar is promoted by Telefónica Tech, Sevilla City Office and FIBES, and has the support of AWS, Proofpoint, Huawei, ZTE, IBM, Cremades & Calvo-Sotelo and El Observatorio.