Advanced Guide to Understanding Cybersecurity in the UAE 

UAE is arming itself, with robust digital transformation and this has been a boon for the nation when it comes to positioning in the global economy.

But with digitization, cyber threats have also increased and it is undoubtedly a thorn in the bush.

Phishing emails as legitimate entities, ransomware attacks targeting sensitive infrastructure and social engineering tactics aimed at exploiting human vulnerabilities.

As the country welcomes advanced technologies like the Internet of Things (IoT) and Artificial Intelligence (AI), the latest attacking verticals are being adopted by cyber hackers.

Let us check out the vulnerable cyber threats that often attack IT infrastructure.

1. Phishing Attack: Phishing is one of the common attacks here in the UAE. More than 40% of the organizations have already reported being attacked by phishing. Cyber hackers target individuals in an organizational structure through fake emails, messages or text messages to get the receiver to unleash sensitive information like log-in credentials or any other financial details.

2. Ransomware Attack: In the past few years ransomware threats have increased in the country. Hackers are employing malware to lock user data and then seek to be paid ransomware to unlock the same.

3. SQL Injection attack: Hackers insert malicious code into a website’s database to fetch sensitive data or manipulate it, usually without any permission from the respective owner of the website.Here in the UAE, this type of attack is quite common, especially among those using web-based applications in business transactions.

4. Cross-Site Scripting Attacks: XSS is rooted in an unauthorized introduction of scripts into a web page resulting to allow hackers fetching away with user information and gaining control of sessions. These sorts of attacks are targeted to gather log-in credentials or spread malicious codes that can destroy the infrastructure on the site.

5. Denial of Service (DoS) Attack: With DoS attacks the website or network gets flooded with traffic, making it uneasy for users to get access. It is being applied either to blackmail people to extract money or permanently stop the business.

6. Insider Threats: An insider threat occurs when a particular employee having legitimate access to an organization’s database has ergo abused the access turning it into a threat.

7. Social Engineering Threat: It involves tricking or tipping an employee or employees to disclose information or committing something contrary to the security policy. In UAE attacks under social engineering are pretexting, baiting and quid pro quo attack type.

8. Malware Attacks: It is an act of using a virus-like program to corrupt an infrastructure or respond to crucial data. Virus attacks here come in an e-mail attachment, contaminated program download or from a contaminated website.

9. Password cracking attacks: When unauthorized attempts hunt in to crack passwords to gain access to certain data it is often termed to be a password attack. In the UAE sensitive institutions are often targeted to fetch passwords and break into the system. Thereby institutions here always use robust password security protocols to keep the system safe.

As UAE continues to lead digital transformation, addressing a few of these challenges requires a concentrated effort both from government and private institutions.

Individuals need to ensure the resilience and security of organizations’ digital landscape. Roping in robust measures relating to cybersecurity in the UAE fosters a betterment and advanced tomorrow.