Ministry of Transport, Information Technology and Communications

Bulgaria has outlined as a priority overcoming the misbalanced access to high-speed internet between urban and rural regions and the accelerated development of e-government with the aim to improve effectiveness in state administration. The Deputy Minister of Transport, information Technology and Communications Valery Borissov announced this during the opening of the “Threats and Challenges to Cyber Security” Conference and added that the strategic objectives envisage ensuring next generation high-speed coverage in the whole country.

The Bulgarian party is actively working on all Internet-related issues, including its management and the field of network and information security, added the Deputy Minister. Following ICANN’s statement that the Bulgarian symbols “.бг“ comply with the requirements for a national Cyrillic domain, an expert group started working on the methodology of selecting an administrator of the Internet Cyrillic names register as well as the general terms for its activity. Organizations that represent the Internet community in Bulgaria have taken part in the preparation. As of mid-October 2014 there has been a Memorandum for cooperation between MTITC and ICANN, which provides new opportunities for exchange of information, training and increase of expert preparation of teams who deal with Internet management.

Bulgaria is monitoring the transformation to an international approach in Internet management and actively participates in the discussions at the level of the European Commission, the International Telecommunications Union and others. “We support the forthcoming transition of Internet management as a global resource with the participation of all stakeholders complying with the principle for equal accessibility to the whole information recourse irrespective of the location of the user and the provider”, said Deputy Minister Borissov. Another highlight in the Bulgarian position is that the World Wide Web should allow for the freedom of speech and respecting users’ rights.

As a continuation of the commitment to the topic, Sofia will host and co-organize the annual meeting of one of the most significant events in the field of Internet Governance - EuroDIG – 2015, June 4 - 5 in Sofia, as well as a regional forum on the topic on June 3, concluded Valery Borissov.

The "Threats and Challenges to Cyber Security" Conference is jointly organized by the Ministry of Transport, Information Technology and Communications (MTITC), the Ministry of Defence, the Atlantic Club of Bulgaria and the British Embassy in Sofia. The forum is dedicated to the security of the system of Internet names in the light of the Cyrillic domain ".bg" and the sharing best practices from leading international experts in the field. John Crane, vice president of ICANN on issues of security, stability and sustainability of the system of domain names, was invited by MTITC as a  keynote speaker.