From a network perspective , Vectra AI really solves our strategy .
COVER STORY
What initial cyber challenges were you facing as a company and how have you worked with Vectra AI to overcome these ?
In today ’ s market there are a lot of security vendors in operation . Therefore , there are an abundance of requirements from a cybersecurity framework . This big marketplace with lots of different tools can get quite complex and we wanted to raise our assurance level in terms of a detection and response capability , using something which would add the best return on investment .
Rather than going out and buying a few different products , when we evaluated where it ’ s best to spend money and get the best return in terms of assurance , that ’ s when we started looking at these MDR solutions and that ’ s where Vectra AI helps us . Vectra AI is a tool or platform that we ’ ve got in our infrastructure which provides a significant amount of assurance in terms of our strategy .
From a network perspective , Vectra AI really solves our strategy . One of the problems we had was monitoring everything and it has the ability to look at vast amounts of data and really give you the alerts and insights needed to solve the problem .
One of the things we considered is how we can leverage AI technologies , such as Machine Learning , automation etc ., to help solve our cybersecurity issue . Human beings are great for emotionaldriven decision-making processes , but not so much when it comes to looking at thousands if not millions of bits of data . That ’ s why AI adds value and then human beings roll with the product .
How has the rate of Digital Transformation in the Middle East been a catalyst for the increasing number of cyberattacks and how does Vectra AI help companies such as yours to tackle this ?
From a network perspective , Vectra AI really solves our strategy .
and maturity and it has worked extremely hard over the last five to 10 years to get to this point . There are also other GCC countries up there in the same bracket .
Everything is becoming digital here in terms of services , companies and partners we work with . A large amount of traffic is therefore entering and exiting the network . The tool is able to see this coming in and from our perspective it ’ s able to cope with the digitalisation and the enablement we ’ re seeing in this region . I don ’ t consider that a challenge in terms of growth as these types of products are designed to scale .
With your extensive experience in the cybersecurity field , what key trends have you seen over the past few years in this region and what do you expect moving forward ?
The regulatory compliance on data is coming . Data privacy and data residency is becoming a significant factor . We ’ re seeing the regulations on cybersecurity that were predominantly with financial services sectors , now being extended across other sectors such as telcos , the listed companies and in fact , any kind of private company of significant operation are now being mandated to meet those same cybersecurity requirements that were initially placed on , for example , regulated entities .
This is good from a CISO perspective because it means they have a regulator that ’ s going to support the type of targets they need to achieve . Those regulations are very strict in terms of the controls you need to have in place and timeframes when reporting incidents . There ’ s definitely an adoption of the historic frameworks now for all entities .
How far has this partnership enhanced your cyber-resilience strategy and what does the future hold ?
It ’ s one of the best investments from an assurance perspective . When you look at a single investment and what it does , it ’ s very difficult to find investments similar to Vectra AI – it ’ s almost a ‘ plug and play ’ type technology – put it on the egress and you ’ ve got a very high level of visibility of everything . This is from a broad perspective of cyber breach , lateral activity and activity going on inside the network that shouldn ’ t be there . That ’ s typically what this tool gives you . From an investment perspective , it buys you a lot of assurance . You need as much activity visibility as possible and it ’ s a key aspect .
Moving forward , I think that the ability to carry out extended detection and response is definitely going to play a part . I see a lot more Machine Learning and AI being integrated , along with being able to carry out more automated responses as we transform and less emphasis on the operators having to deal with that type of thing . I believe automation and response will be included in the response . u
In the Gulf – predominantly the epicentre of our operations – the change is rapid . The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is now in the top two or three countries in cybersecurity in terms of capabilities
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