KUALA LUMPUR, April 25 — The advancement of technology, in particular, the widespread use of internet has given rise to a new threat in the form of cyberattacks, Defence Minister Mohamad Sabu said yesterday.

He said nowadays, anyone from any location with a device such as a smartphone could carry out such attacks against any target in the world.

"Cyberattacks can be very complicated to deal with and require a totally new doctrine for us to counter it effectively.

"We need a new type of soldier, one with sound knowledge in information technology,” he said in his speech discussing the aftermath of ISISI defeat in Syria and Iraq as well as its implications at the 8th Moscow Conference on International Security (MCIS) in Moscow.

Meanwhile, he said combating terrorism required better cooperative security strategies in various forms, either hard or soft approaches.

"We are now fighting the narrative of terrorism through social media. We are now facing with lone wolf extremists who are full of anger and hatred and the recent incident in New Zealand obviously shows that terrorism belongs to no religion in this world.

"There is no ‘one size fits all’ in terms of violent extremist or terrorist profile, set of motivations, level of radicalisation and extremism, and their trajectories,” he said, adding it was fundamental for everyone to be united to fight against terrorism effectively. — Bernama