Around 99% of organizations in the UAE faced identity related security breaches at least once or twice within the last 12 months, according to CyberArk’s Threat Landscape EMEA Report 2024 (pdf). 99% faced two or more attacks during the same period, with the number one cause for cyberattacks being remote or hybrid work, according to the report. Increased use of on-premises and SaaS applications is the second most common cause of identity breaches, it said.

Phishing and vishing are the most common types of cyberattacks: Around 98% of UAE organizations have been breached due to phishing and vishing — voice phishing — attacks, with almost 51% of organizations facing negative impacts on their businesses due to breaches.

The good news: Some 81% of UAE companies have adopted cyberins. policies to mitigate risk, while 92% have automated their phishing analysis process, the report said. Some 56% plan to boost identity-related products or services by over 10% next year.

UAE workers know their way around a deepfake: Around 86% of C-level respondents in the UAE expressed confidence in their employees' ability to identify deepfakes of their executives, compared to 74% of all other respondents in the EMEA region.

The UAE's C-level respondents identified AI-powered malware as the top threat from AI tools in the next year, while others in the region identified AI-powered data poisoning as the primary concern.

Around 73% of respondents in the UAE suggest that up to half of all identities, including humans and machines, have access to sensitive data, highlighting the necessity to reassess their definition of “privileged users,” which provides specific users with the authority to perform security-related functions, according to the report.

Adopting cloud security services: Around 64% of organizations in the UAE currently use three or more cloud service providers, exceeding the EMEA average of 55%, with primary concerns revolving around data privacy and software vulnerabilities in cloud security, according to the report.

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