Microsoft reiterated its message of “Securing the Hybrid Workplace” at GISEC 2021, operating its Microsoft Hub at the event, and offering demonstrations and expert perspectives alongside its security industry partners. Microsoft’s GISEC 2021 theme reflects the region’s rapid migration to complex multi-cloud environments that cater to both on-premises and remote working.
“Microsoft spends more than US$ 1 billion annually on security and in the new world of hybrid work, businesses are facing an increase in volume of data, evolving complexities and frequency of data security breaches,” said Sayed Hashish, General Manager, Microsoft UAE. “We blocked some 30 billion email threats in 2020 alone, so we know the scale of the issue. The UAE government has correctly identified cybercrime as a challenge to business continuity and economic growth. It has been working in partnership with Microsoft on providing a safe infrastructure to local entities, underpinned among others by Microsoft’s state of the art UAE cloud data centres.”
Microsoft security experts urge GISEC 2021 attendees to ‘Secure the Hybrid Workplace’.
This year, Microsoft will be marking the second anniversary of its Middle East datacenters to deliver on the UAE’s growth agenda. These cloud regions are playing a vital role in securing enterprises in the country while accelerating their digital transformation journeys by providing enterprise grade cloud services combined with data residency, privacy, and the broadest compliance offering in the industry.
The Microsoft Hub will feature activations including the ‘Selfie Mirror’, which uses green-screen technology to let people see in real time what they would look like on a magazine cover, and later get to print out their photo on the magazine cover and keep it as a souvenir. The ‘Car Brain Wave Race’ activation by Dubai World Trade Centre, is allowing people to race cars around a track with the help of neural brainwaves. Microsoft Security Partners Paramount, Delphi, Adfolks, and Intertec will also showcase their solutions at The Microsoft Hub.
“By one estimate, we see almost 600 attempts each second to steal passwords,” said Paula Januszkiewicz, Founder and CEO of CQURE and a Microsoft Enterprise Security Consultant. “We must ready ourselves for the age of hybrid work. We must take a long, hard look at our expanding attack surfaces and our new hybrid environments to determine where our strengths and weaknesses are and how we can adopt a threat posture that is appropriate to the moment.”
Januszkiewicz was a part of a session called “Biggest Threats When Working from Home” and delivered a live hacking demo for delegates to experience what an attack by a hacker could look like in real time.
