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Gulf Business
8 hours ago
- Business
- Gulf Business
Building a resilient digital economy: How stc group is advancing cybersecurity for businesses and people
Image: Getty Images As the world embraces rapid technological advancements, the digital landscape is evolving at an unprecedented pace. Innovations like cloud computing, IoT, AI, and blockchain are reshaping industries, but they also bring growing cyber threats. With cybercrime projected to cost the global economy trillions annually, cybersecurity has become cornerstone of digital resilience and economic stability. In Saudi Arabia, stc group is leading the charge, advancing cybersecurity to protect businesses, individuals, and the kingdom's digital future. With a cybersecurity index (CS Index) rating of 89.88 per cent and a capability maturity level of 4.51 surpassing the global telecom average of 65.7 per cent Innovative cybersecurity solutions for a secure ecosystem To address the growing sophistication of cyber threats across industries — from healthcare and finance to logistics — stc group has developed a robust cybersecurity framework designed to safeguard businesses, government institutions, and individuals from evolving threats, ensuring a secure digital ecosystem for all stakeholders. At the heart of this strategy is sirar by stc, recognised as one of the top managed security service providers (MSSP) in MENA. Its Threat Intelligence service leverages AI-powered analytics and big data insights to identify, analyse and neutralise cyber threats before they escalate, providing organisations with a proactive defense mechanism. During Black Hat 2024 in Riyadh – the world's fastest- growing cybersecurity event, sirar by stc launched a groundbreaking service called 'Athar', a Saudi-developed solution designed to protect sensitive data from leaks and enhance organisational resilience against cyberthreats. Strengthened by sirar by stc's advanced security solutions, stc's Security Operations Center (SOC) provides real-time monitoring and rapid incident response capabilities, enabling proactive threat detection and mitigation to minimise the impact of cyberattacks for both the public and private sectors. In addition to delivering cutting-edge cybersecurity solutions, stc group is committed to fostering a secure ecosystem through its Security Pass Program. This initiative requires partners to obtain compliance certification from authorised audit firms, ensuring that all entities within stc's network adheres to the highest cybersecurity standards. Strengthening cybersecurity through global collaboration stc group's ecosystem spans telecommunications, cloud computing, IoT, AI, and digital infrastructure, all secured by advanced cybersecurity measures. These efforts are further amplified through strategic collaborations with both local and global partners. At the national level, stc works closely with the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology and the Saudi National Cybersecurity Authority (NCA) to strengthen the kingdom's digital infrastructure. These partnerships not only enhance technical capabilities but also foster a culture of cybersecurity awareness and innovation across the country. On the global stage, stc has forged major partnerships with leading technology and cybersecurity providers to elevate its offerings. In 2024, the group announced its partnership with Oracle to enhance cloud security and data sovereignty, ensuring compliance with regional regulations while bolstering infrastructure resilience. Through sirar by stc, the group partnered with Google Cloud Security to deploy AI-driven cybersecurity solutions tailored to regional needs. Additionally, sirar expanded its long-standing collaboration with Group-IB, advancing risk and attack management capabilities. As stc continues to expand its global footprint, cybersecurity remains at the core of its growth strategy, ensuring that every new technology and service is built on a secure, resilient foundation. Read:
Forbes
22-05-2025
- Business
- Forbes
CISOs Will Bring Their ‘Worst Job' Experiences Into The Spotlight
If you're reading this newsletter, you know that a CISO's job is much more exciting than what many people might picture: sitting in front of a computer, staring at a screen and occasionally going to meetings. This fall, the world will get the chance to see the reality of one of the most consequential and high-pressure roles in business today. Nagomi Security and Hacker Valley Media announced earlier this month the upcoming documentary series: CISO: The Worst Job I Ever Wanted. The inspiration for the series came from a closed-door roundtable that the cybersecurity company hosted at Black Hat 2024 conference, at which CISOs were able to speak candidly about the emotional impact of their role. 'These stories aren't comfortable. They're real,' Chief Creative Officer at Hacker Valley Media and series director Clint Howard II said in a press release. 'We wanted to show the human being behind the role, and what it actually feels like to carry that responsibility every day. It's about helping the industry evolve and giving these leaders the backing they deserve.' Each episode will focus on one CISO's story and the decisions that have kept them up at night, the most stressful moments and the reasons why they stayed in the job. The announcement didn't give details about the individual episodes, but said the series would be available on major streaming platforms and a dedicated campaign site. The teaser trailer, set to dramatic music, gives a brief history of the CISO role and features several people sharing snippets of stories of stress and exhilaration on the job. The documentary will offer an inside look at what the job is actually like—and may inspire a new generation to pursue this 'worst job.' A documentary series isn't needed to spur investment in cybersecurity; most companies consistently say that IT and tech upgrades—especially around AI—are some of their top spending priorities. However, the current economic uncertainty is making many CIOs expect budget cuts. But that doesn't have to stop investment plans. I talked to two executives at enterprise tech consulting firm Rimini Street—CEO Seth Ravin and CFO Michael Perica—about how companies can cut their IT budgets without sacrificing technological advancements. An excerpt from our conversation is later in this newsletter. Then-Apple Chief Design Officer Jony Ive (L) and Apple CEO Tim Cook inspect an iPhone XR during an Apple event in 2018. OpenAI is getting into the device business. The company announced this week that it purchased legendary Apple designer Jony Ive's hardware startup in a deal worth $6.5 billion. OpenAI and Ive's business, known as io, are collaborating to create AI-native hardware products. Ive, Apple's longtime chief design officer, is known for designing the iPhone, iPod, iPad and MacBook Air. He left Apple in 2019, and a statement from Ive and OpenAI founder and CEO Sam Altman said Ive has worked with them on product design for two years. In a video announcing their partnership, Ive and Altman talk about innovative device prototypes that will democratize AI access, but give no specifics. At the end of the video, it says products will be shared in 2026. Altman and Ive previewed what they were working on to OpenAI staff Wednesday, the Wall Street Journal reports. The device is unlikely to have a screen, but will be small enough to rest in a pocket or desk. It will be aware of a user's surroundings, and will not be glasses. Altman said Ive is skeptical of devices worn on the body. The Journal reports that OpenAI plans to have 100 million of the devices shipped soon after they launch. Forbes contributor Tor Constantino talked to several AI experts about what the partnership between Ive and OpenAI means. The overwhelming answer: It could revolutionize the space. 'If OpenAI can combine its world-class AI brain with hardware designed by Ive, they could make AI feel natural and effortless in our hands. That would drive behavioral change at scale,' Conor Grennan, chief AI architect at NYU Stern School of Business and CEO of consultancy AI Mindset told Constantino. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella speaks at the Microsoft Build 2025 conference opening keynote this week. As tech companies host their annual product meetings and showcases, many new plans and platforms for taking better advantage of AI and integrating it into enterprise infrastructure are being announced. Microsoft unveiled an 'open agentic web' vision at its Build 2025 developer conference, writes Forbes senior contributor Janakiram MSV. It's adding an AI coding agent in GitHub Copilot, making a seamless hosting and development platform that works with a wide variety of AI models known as the Azure AI Foundry, and bringing AI development into Windows 11. A new Copilot Tuning function allows enterprises to shape their AI agents to their specific business contexts. Microsoft also announced NLWeb, which Janakiram wrote allows developers to add more conversational interaction capabilities. Red Hat introduced its AI Inference Server, an open source platform that can work with different AI platforms and more quickly work through the data. It's built on Red Hat's vLLM project, which mitigates the memory and workload challenges for working through traditional LLMs. The company also announced its Enterprise Linux 10, writes Forbes senior contributor Adrian Bridgwater. The platform helps companies not only work in the new technologies of the present, but also architect the future to thrive in a hybrid cloud and AI framework, integrating NIST standards for post-quantum cryptography. President Donald Trump speaks about his budget bill in the U.S. Capitol while House Speaker Mike Johnson listens. President Donald Trump's 'big, beautiful bill' that codifies tax cuts, significantly increases defense spending, and slashes spending on social safety net programs including Medicaid, passed the House of Representatives by a one-vote margin Thursday morning. But the controversial legislation also contains a tech-related proposal that's received less attention: a prohibition on state AI laws for 10 years. Forbes contributor Anisha Sircar writes that this provision, added to the bill by the House Energy and Commerce Committee, has drawn condemnation from state attorneys general, industry advocates, state governments and consumer groups. 'Imposing a broad moratorium on all state action while Congress fails to act in this area is irresponsible and deprives consumers of reasonable protections,' a coalition of state attorneys general wrote. Federal laws overrule state laws, but that generally happens when a federal law on the same issue is passed; there usually isn't a federal prohibition on state action first. There are currently no prominent federal efforts to regulate AI. Soon after taking office, Trump rescinded a Biden-era executive order that staked out a path for the federal government to promote both development and regulation of AI, and no popular legislation or executive orders have replaced it. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, 48 states and Puerto Rico have introduced AI legislation, and 26 states have adopted at least 75 new AI measures. Advocates say if the federal measure goes forward, it will undermine privacy, business development and states' efforts to protect their residents. Rimini Street CEO Seth Ravin and CFO Michael Perica. As tariffs loom, companies are making changes to keep their goods and services on the market without losing profits, but budget cuts are on the table everywhere. And while the vast majority of companies are putting a priority on tech transformation, it's likely that IT budgets will be among the first things cut. I talked to two executives at enterprise tech consulting firm Rimini Street—CEO Seth Ravin and CFO Michael Perica—about how companies can cut their IT budgets without sacrificing technological advancements. This conversation has been edited for length, clarity and continuity. A longer version of this interview is available here. It also was excerpted in the Forbes CFO newsletter. About how much does your average company spend on tech that they don't need, like outmoded programs, updates, unused logins? Ravin: I would be surprised if you didn't see at least 30% wastage—or more—in the IT budget. We believe even we have 30% we can take out. About 30% to 50% could be cut and streamlined in the years ahead. How do companies rack up so much in IT contracts that they continue to pay for and don't need? Ravin: Most of it is because you have a bunch of different IT groups, and because a lot of this stuff is SaaS now, you have someone in a department who charges a new piece of software on a credit card. It doesn't even go through IT. IT departments are chasing down purchases that they didn't even authorize. They've had a hell of a time pulling it all together and figuring out what it is. We just went through an exercise, Michael and his team, to say: We know what the IT budget is. How much are we really spending on IT? We went department by department and sure enough, we found about 30% more than the actual budget as IT. We have a plan with our new CIO. He's restructuring IT. We're going to go ferret out all the individual IT stuff. We're going to pull it together, streamline it. We're going to do exactly what our work with our customers is. Every software company right now is asking its customers to do big migrations and upgrades. If you're Salesforce, I want you to put in Lightning and our AI agents. If you're SAP, I want you to mandatorily upgrade to S/4HANA for potentially hundreds of millions in costs. Microsoft wants you to do Windows 11 across 27,000 workstations. They're sitting there with hundreds of applications and there's literally not enough people, time and money to do everything every one of these vendors wants you to do. The reality is for most companies, these changes are work projects. They really don't change the trajectory of the company. If I change out my payroll system that's working, are my employees going to be happier because the direct deposits somehow come from a different company? They don't care. If it's working and it's accurate and it lands in their account on time, then they're happy. So what are you going to get out of the change for millions of dollars of the payroll system if it doesn't actually improve your business in a way that makes you more competitively advantaged or helps drive your costs down? There's so many of these projects being asked of the CIO and the CFO, their heads are spinning. Perica: What he just described was the normal operating procedure—and the challenge—prior to 'Liberation Day.' To shift the supply chain—and I did it in a prior CFO chair—the IT organization is a critical component. To have even one major upgrade project that's not going to have impact on operation, other than disruption, because it's forced by the vendor, is just going to be compounding in this environment where one needs to be flexible. The IT organization has to be in lockstep with the operation side to be flexible, to assist with scenario analysis and be ready to move swiftly when there is a plan that has been decided at the C-suite and board level on how to manage one's supply chain. We're at the dawn of bringing AI into businesses, and everything that I've read from analysts and experts has said the same thing about bringing AI to the enterprise level: Companies that get AI and get IT entrenched in it will be the ones who move ahead. If you don't, you're going to be catching up. As IT budgets are going down, how can businesses cut costs and bring AI into their systems? Ravin: There is only so much people, time and money. That's the only three ingredients we have in it to bake a pie. They're all limited things, and most CIOs would love to do every upgrade known to mankind. It's their nature. They want the latest, greatest of every piece of software and everything else. But then the reality of the world sets in. There's only so many people. There's only so much time and there's only so much money, so they reluctantly have to make decisions. The point we're at right now is if you try to follow the roadmap of all of your software vendors, you couldn't possibly do the innovation you need because you'd be busy doing upgrades to stuff you don't need. This is a moment for Rimini Street's smart path methodology, which is really just saying, look, we're going to have to make some tough decisions. You're going to have to say, 'I'd love a new car every three years, but you know what? This car is good for 15 years. I'm going to have to drive it maybe for 10, and I don't get a new car every three years because I'm going to spend my money on some of this new AI technology instead.' You have to be willing to make the tough decisions. And I really think if I were to distill down the lesson for your article, the lesson is you're going to be making more tough decisions in IT than you have ever had to make. This is a time when you have to have the strength of CIOs and CFOs who are really the backbone on this. The CFO, their nature is everyone's ripping me off. Do we really need to spend money on that? It's the nature of your role. It's who you are. In today's situation, how important is fast ROI on your tech systems? Ravin: You go through these cycles. We were through the 2001 dot-com bubble, the 2007 meltdown, the 2021 pandemic. Even though our smart path is a 1, 2, 3: cut costs, reinvest them, streamline systems, and then buy the new technology [with the savings] and use that money, so you don't spend any more than your full budget today. Depending on the company, there could be some that want to jump immediately to that transformation because there's really something there that can help. One of our clients just implemented [robotic process] automation. They automated one task, and they went from 130 people doing one job down to 80. How many guys out there in this market and environment wouldn't love to see things happen like that in their business? And that comes from transformation. Some companies will want to race through, so they'll want to quickly cut costs, quickly streamline and then move immediately to get that done. Others which are just super cost sensitive, like retailers with their 1% margin, may linger more on the savings for now. They may say, 'Right now, we just have to cut costs in order to be viable. And so we're going to do the cost cutting. We will slow-play a little bit on the system streamlining and doing the next phase of transformation.' I think people will move at different paces depending on which layer they think will generate the best returns for them. But the No. 1 thing: You always have to have an immediate return, even if that is just cost savings. Perica: There's been so much investment, so much promise of the medium and long term. We all see the business analysis, and usually it misses. The time is now, as Seth noted, that the actions have to lead to definitive near-term savings with these automation tools and the need to utilize properly and efficiently what I've already put in place. On top of that, never has there been a better time to achieve an immediate ROI, not only from your existing assets that you are running. It can run better. Trust us. Ravin: It may not be a fun time for a lot of people in the workforce. I've been traveling the world and doing a lot of meetings with various leaders of major companies. I'll tell you, even governments like in Malaysia and Indonesia, they recognize now that AI with agents can replace people doing tasks on this administrative layer. People who keep the wheels turning, move the papers, do the approvals, 40% could come out of the workforce with the technology we already have. It's stunning. It's like another industrial revolution. Disruption from AI adoption, urgent needs to protect data sovereignty and waning trust in U.S.-based tech are bringing CISOs to a crossroads of figuring out how to move forward. Here's how to advance on all fronts with both caution and resilience for the future. New AI operations aren't always successful, and it's often an issue of execution rather than ambition. Here are ways you can work with employees to increase your chances of successful AI implementation. Which successful mobile games company recently pivoted to enterprise AI? A. Zynga B. Rovio C. Niantic D. Scopely See if you got the answer right here.
Leaders
14-04-2025
- Business
- Leaders
Saudi Arabia to Host GCF Annual Meeting in October
The National Cybersecurity Authority (NCA) will host the Global Cybersecurity Forum (GCF) Annual Meeting from October 1 to 2 in Riyadh, according to the Saudi Press Agency. Uder the auspicious of the Two Holy Mosques King Salman bin Abdulaziz, the forum will bring together an elite of decision makers, policy makers, industry experts along with cybersecurity specialists from all over the world. Themed 'Scaling Cohesive Advancement in Cyberspace,' the event will feature several strategic dialogues and high-level international meetings on the challenges and opportunities of cybersecurity. As for sub-themes, the 2025 edition will focus on five topics, as follows: Beyond the Inflection Point Cyber Economics Redefined Strengthening Cyber Inclusion Behavioral Lens in Cyberspace Opportunities at the Cyber Horizon Through these themes and sub-themes, the GCF Annual Meeting 2025 seeks to stimulate international talks toward a reliable and secure cyberspace that significantly supports economic growth, societal prosperity, individual security, and national stability. Since its launch in 2020 as an annual event, the forum has greatly transformed into a prestigious platform gathering decision makers and cybersecurity leaders across the world. The GCF's remarkable progress stands as a testament to Saudi Arabia's pioneering role in unleashing new horizons for international cooperation and developing human capabilities in cybersecurity. Related Topics: KAUST, Fincantieri Forge Partnership to Advance Maritime Cybersecurity Black Hat 2024: Exploring Global Cybersecurity Landscape in Riyadh Saudi Ministry of Foreign Affairs Elevates Cybersecurity System with SITE Short link : Post Views: 61
