Assistant Minister for Defence Andrew Hastie outlined that the program is expected to enhance Australia’s sovereign cyber workforce capabilities.

“Cyber is the new battleground, and the important mission our service men and women undertake in cyber space will be vital to keeping Australians safe and secure.” Assistant Minister Hastie said.

“The ADF is looking for a diverse group of applicants who are passionate about cyber and interested in a career with Defence.

“The ADF Cyber Gap Program will expose you to the critical mission Defence personnel carry out in cyber space and I encourage young Australians to take up this exciting career opportunity with the ADF.

“This program plays an important part in building the strong, diverse cyber workforce that is essential to our national security.”

The announcement follows several warnings from Defence about malicious actors looking to disrupt Australia’s cyber network, especially with an upsurge in reported ransomware cases.

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“Backups are one of the best ways to build resistance against ransomware, making it much harder for cyber criminals to hold Australians to ransom,” Assistant Minister Hastie said earlier in August.

“Regularly backing up your data and keeping it off your network on a USB or in the cloud will make it faster and easier to restore your important files if they ever become lost, stolen, or compromised.

“In the case of ransomware, it may not be possible to recover data and get your business or projects back up and running without backups stored offline.”

The recent increase in ransomware occurrences prompted the federal opposition to reintroduce the Ransomware Payments Bill 2021.

 [Related: ADF leverages cyber simulator to gain warfighting edge]