MENA E-Crime and Cyber Resilience Summit 2021 – Day 1

MENA E-Crime and Cyber Resilience Summit 2021 kick started with a welcome note & opening remarks followed by several interesting presentations by international well-known professionals. The conference included discussions and presentation on topics like ‘The Three Musketeers of 2021 – The Pandemic, Digital Transformation and Cyber Security’; ‘Proactive Defense, The Future of Cyber Operation Centre’; ‘A global perspective on Cybercrime: Phenomena, Challenges and Legal Response’ and many more.

MENA E-Crime and Cyber Resilience Summit 2021 day one started with a welcome note by H.E. Dr. Mohamed Al-Kuwaiti, Managing Director & Head of Cyber Security at National Data Centre under the Supreme Council for National Security. It was one of those sessions that cannot be missed. It was followed by an interesting presentation on ‘The Three Musketeers of 2021 – The Pandemic, Digital Transformation and Cyber Security’ by Neil J. Walsh, Director – Cybercrime, Terrorist Financing and Anti-Money Laundering Department, United Nations. He shared views on how to rethink cybersecurity strategies in this era where digital transformation has taken over the world by a storm and he also shed light on how to balance digital transformation and cyber resilience during the post pandemic era.

Neil J. Walsh closed his session by giving few new golden rules for cyber-resilient digital entities of the future. This session was followed by a presentation by Director of Cybercrime at INTERPOL, Craig Jones. He started his presentation by introducing various types of cyberthreats and also mentioned prevention techniques from which some were implemented by the INTERPOL themselves when handling such cases. He also talked about how law enforcement authorities developed operational responses in combating cybercrime and lastly, he touched base with how to set up anti-cybercrime strategic goals in the present era of international and connected crimes.

The session was then handed over to the Cloud Security – EMEAR at Cisco, Alessandro Monforte. He explained how digital transformation has suddenly taken over the scene right after the COVID19 struck which changed the scenario of the world. Alessandro Monforte also spoke about how SASE will be the transformation tool for IT Security especially in businesses. The next session talked about Proactive Defense and the Future of Cyber Operation Centre which was done by Eng. Yasser Jamaan Alghamdi, who is the Cyber Defense Center Director at STC. This was proceeded by the first panel discussion of the day ‘CISO Panel – The Changing Threat Landscape’.

The session had panelists Shaik Abdulkhader, Chief Information Security Officer at Leading Energy Company in Qatar; Steven Sim, President at ISACA Singapore Chapter; Abis Ali, Head of Cyber Security and Cloud at Lock&Stock and Chandra Mouli, CI0 & CTO at Sankara Nethralaya, India. They discussed about how companies have now started countering threats and started achieving digital resilience, what are the top priorities pf CISO’s in the post pandemic world and how the CISO’s are managing security strategy in the age of remote workforce and focus on business continuity.  This session was then followed by a panel discussion moderated by Simon John Newman who is the Head of Cyber and Business Services at Police Crime Prevention Initiatives with panelists Dr. Hossam Nabil, the Associate Professor in Criminal Investigation – Head of Policing Management & Social Sciences Section at Dubai Police Academy and Saad Alqahtany, the Head of Video Forensics at Forensics and Criminology Department at Department of Criminology and Forensics.

They mainly discussed about the economic impact of cybercrime in MENA region, what are the threats and challenges to look out for and the counter measures to take when faced with such situations. This was then taken over by Hessa Salem Al Nahdi, the Chief Information Security Officer, Corporate Security Section at Department of Culture and Tourism Abu Dhabi where she discussed the importance of cyber security in the field of Tourism and Culture. The session was closed by an amazing panel discussion lead by the Senior Vice President & CISO of PayU, Prakash Padariya with panelists Dr. Erdal Ozkaya, Eng. Abdullah Faisal Biary, Chief Information Security Officer at United Cooperative Assurance, and Jawad Khalid Mirza, Chief Information Security Officer at Askari Bank.

The conference will be held online for 2 days, 24^rd and 25^th of May. It will continue with more topics and speakers tomorrow some of which include Roly Stride, Regional Director Middle East, Darktrace; Hani Bani Amer, Senior Manager IT Security Operations – Group IT, Shared Services Center, National Critical Infrastructure; Paolo Miranda, Director, Volunteer Outreach, (ISC)2 Singapore Chapter; Seth Youssef, Principal Security Architect, Field CTO Office, Snowflake and many more.