Pakistan's tech startups shine at GISEC
DUBAI: All seven Pakistani tech startups participating in this year's Gulf Information Security Expo and Conference (GISEC) made it to the pitch competition semi-finals, amid a backdrop of reports that there was a major uptick in cyber attacks between India and Pakistan during recent tensions.
The group of budding entrepreneurs was sponsored by Ignite - National Technology Fund, a Pakistan Ministry of IT & Telecom initiative.
While none made the final cut, they found there were other wins to be made at the expo.
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'We just signed a deal with an IT distributor in the Gulf, which has presence in Bahrain, the UAE, Ireland and New Zealand,' Waqar Ahmed, CEO of Securitanium, told Business Recorder.
'We will be onboarding with them as a vendor for email security, and hopefully, we will collaborate with them to offer our product to their clients in future.'
'More than 80% of cyber attacks are caused by phishing emails despite having email gateway protection,' said Ahmed.
'They are not detecting the content or analyzing the body of the email. Our artificial intelligence (AI) powered solution not only looks at the IP and domain, but also analyzes the content for indicators of phishing and removes such emails.'
According to the participants, AI is not just a trend but the next step in strengthening online security.
'AI is the talk of the town, wherever you go, wherever you speak, whatever you hear, there is always AI,' said Muhammad Ali Inayat, founder of Pakistani company ComplianceMachine.ai.
According to him, it's an exciting time to be in the cybersecurity industry in the Gulf region, especially in the UAE and Saudi Arabia, where the Personal Data Protection Act has been recently enacted.
Inayat is also CEO of Kinverg, ComplianceMachine.ai's parent company that already has a presence in the Gulf region.
Globally, he said, data protection has taken off in the last decade, and that has made compliance challenging for companies to operate across the world.
'We are promising to reduce the cost of compliance by 50% by providing companies with pre-built controls which are mapped to all of these regulatory frameworks.'
Pakistani startups offered all kinds of security products at the event. Thingzeye featured its network security protection service for home and office smart devices, as well as for medical devices.
'Our Smart Home Firewall provides protection to all the smart gadgets that kids use at home,' said CEO Ghalib Asadullah Shah. 'It also provides parental control and children's social behaviour analysis. It profiles all the devices that are used at your home.'
'It identifies and provides information about all the devices which may be connected to your home network,' he added.
The protection is also extended to devices that capture personal health data, including smartwatches and heart monitors.
Shah said coming to GISEC gave him confidence in his company's product.
'The experience has been wonderful for us,' he said.
'I got exposure and I got some confidence as well because it gives us a platform where we can compete at the international level. That's what we have gained here: don't be afraid of coming to an international stage and don't underestimate yourself, you have the potential.'
It is the presence of such talent that encouraged 'Ignite - National Technology Fund, a Ministry of IT & Telecom initiative,' to bring Pakistani startups to the event. Ignite focuses on fourth industrial wave tech and on ecosystem development initiatives to fulfill its mission of creating a knowledge economy in Pakistan, says the organization's website. Its national network of incubators nurtures startups, while tech innovation grants are offered to innovative, deep tech projects and startups.
'GISEC is our partner at Digital Pakistan Cyber Security Hackathon and we're looking forward to a long-lasting relationship,' said Adeel Aijaz Shaikh,
Ignite's CEO, adding that they're hoping to bring more teams and startups to next year's event.
Inayat and Shah both said they would encourage Pakistani youth to step into this trending industry.
'Pakistan is full of potential when it comes to cybersecurity,' said Inayat. 'The first virus in the world was also built right in Lahore, by the way. We know this field very well.'
Shah echoed his peer's words.
'If you have an interesting, innovative idea, just come and pitch [at GISEC] and you will find a lot of people who are interested in your product,' he said.
Khalid Yacoob, an event visitor, was surprised to see a Pakistan pavillion.
'I'm originally from Pakistan and it is lovely to see that Pakistan is getting involved in the industry of cybersecurity,' said the director of business development at IT consultancy HiveMind Global.
GISEC took place from May 6 to 8, attracting some 750 cybersecurity companies and 25,0000 visitors from over 160 countries. Attendees were able to participate in hackathons and panel discussions.
The UAE Cybersecurity Council, host of GISEC Global, earned 11 Guinness World Records through the event, it said. This included 'most nationalities in a simulated Dark Web intelligence training session' and 'largest ransomware awareness session.'
Copyright Business Recorder, 2025
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