UAE works 'day and night' to fight off 200,000 daily cyberattacks: Top official

The UAE faces an average of 200,000 cyberattacks each day, but the country's cybersecurity agencies work around the clock to defend against these threats.

Mohamed Al Kuwaiti, the UAE government’s head of cyber security, said attacker are targeting smart cities, which simply refers to cities that use digital technologies in its services, and exploiting vulnerabilities to take down important infrastructures, which he said, “impacts [the UAE]’s economy, stability, and national security."

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A cyberattack is a malicious attempt by a hacker to take control of computer systems without authorisation. In a national context, cyberattacks can harm different sectors such as healthcare, energy, electricity, aviation, etc. Al Kuwaiti said that the UAE “conducts many of those trainings in order to do cyberattack drills to leverage and enhance security.”

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With the advent of AI, Al Kuwaiti said, cyberattacks are now becoming more complex and harder to detect. “As we use AI for protection, others use AI for attack,” he said. “Our policing entities work day and night to ensure all of those are responded to.” 

Cyber security awareness

“Phishing is still one of the major types of attacks, as a matter of fact, that starts from the weakest link, which is the human. And that social engineering will always be the number one type of deception that we see across many of these, Al Kuwaiti said.

“However, it costs us so much. And this is why we always leverage the cybersecurity culture and the awareness, and work together with everybody in order to spread that awareness.” 

He added, “The human factor is the number one priority, where we need to enhance their capabilities, their abilities, as well as re-skilling and up-skilling in many of those aspects, be it the technical people or be it the younger generation.”

In February of this year, the UAE cabinet officially approved the National Cybersecurity Strategy, a five-year plan that the country aims to create a safe and strong cyber infrastructure. The strategy is built around five main pillars which are designed to ensure the safe and rapid adoption of innovations while ensuring a secure, resilient, and robust digital environment. 

Hind Aldah

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hind@khaleejtimes.com

Hind Aldah covers business, tech, crypto and all that jazz for a younger audience. In her spare time, you will find her playing classical guitar, painting amateur oil paintings, or crocheting the same old scarf that leads nowhere.