69% of companies expect a cyberattack within a year

The majority (69%) of company leaders in the UAE expect to face a cyber attack within the next 12 months, but only 49% of these companies feel they are prepared for this attack, according to a new research study by the cloud communications company Cloudflare .

The research study, which was conducted with nearly 1,000 business and technology leaders across the Middle East (330 from the UAE), as part of a larger survey of more than 4,000 companies in 13 European markets, showed the following results:

Cyber ​​attacks are widespread and their numbers are increasing:
– More than half (52%) of organizations in the UAE said they had experienced at least one cyber attack in the past 12 months, with the majority under multiple attacks. This number is much higher than in Europe, where it is 40%.

Participants representing the 16% of the survey who said they had been assaulted in the past year said they were assaulted every six to 11 days on average.

– 63% of organizations believe that the number of these cyber attacks will increase in the next 12 months.

Organizations in the UAE must pay attention to these attack vectors:
– Business and technology leaders in the UAE report that the three most common types of cyber attacks they face are web attacks (69%), phishing (47%), and insider threats/login data theft ( 36%), and the most impressive. Threats are: They are malware (like viruses, worms, and Trojans).

The impact of the hack extends beyond material loss:
Lack of preparedness represents a risk to institutions, and the consequences of overconfidence in the current level of preparedness could be dire. 68% of respondents from organizations exposed to attacks in the past 12 months see the financial impact of these attacks as at least $1 million, and nearly a quarter of the organizations that participated in the survey (24%) believe that the loss is due to these attacks. $2 million or more.

– Loss does not depend only on the financial impact; 40% of participants said their organizations halted growth plans after the attacks they were exposed to, and 37% of organizations laid off their employees due to the economic impact of cyber attacks.

Bashar Bashayra, Regional Vice President for the Middle East and Turkey at Cloudflare, said: “The survey clearly shows that Emirati business leaders are preparing for an increase in the number of cyber threats, and feel that they are not ready to deal with them effectively. Good preparation is the best way to deal with these cyber threats Instead of complex and disparate systems, business and IT leaders must adopt a holistic approach to “security everywhere.” Much more needs to be invested in integrated solutions that support a comprehensive cloud strategy and help organizations address the challenges of an increasingly diverse threat landscape. The Zero Trust model is a key part of this approach to help organizations prepare in multiple ways and implement a strong security culture.”