Cyber Week 2023: Top cybersecurity experts gather to discuss latest trends

Image credit: Divsha Bhat / Gulf Business

The 13th edition of Cyber Week, an annual cybersecurity event held at Tel Aviv University, concluded successfully, bringing together notable individuals from various sectors including industry, government, military, and academia.

Over 11,000 attendees from 99 countries participated at the event.

The event was jointly organised by the Blavatnik Interdisciplinary Cyber Research Center, the Yuval Ne’eman Workshop for Science, Technology and Security at Tel Aviv University and the Israeli National Cyber Directorate under the Prime Minister’s Office along with the Israel’s Ministry of Economy and Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Participants showcased the latest developments, challenges and opportunities in the field of cybersecurity.

Cyber Week featured speakers from around the world, including leading Israeli government officials such as Gaby Portnoy, director-general of the Israel National Cyber Directorate (INCD) and Ronen Bar, director of the Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet).

#CyberWeek2023 @CyberWeekTLV was a smashing success! Over 11,000 guests from 100 countries, 400 speakers and 50 events. They covered everything cyber, from existential fears to real threats and laid out the groundwork for solutions & collaboration. See you there next year! pic.twitter.com/yeysPwKh0V

— Tel Aviv University (@TelAvivUni) June 29, 2023

Maj. Gen. (Ret.) Prof Isaac Ben-Israel, recognised as the “father” of the Israeli Cyber industry, led the conference.

Global cyber officials also made significant contributions, including Kemba Eneas Walden, acting national cyber director in the Office of the National Cyber Director; Nathaniel C. Fick, ambassador at Large for Cyberspace and Digital Policy at the US Department of State; Minister Audrey Tang, Ministry of Digital Affairs Taiwan; Sami Khoury, head of the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security; Dr Mohamed Al Kuwaiti, head of Cybersecurity for the UAE Government; Craig Jones, cybercrime director at Interpol and Ann Dunkin, chief information officer of the US Department of Energy.

The conference also welcomed private sector leaders, such as Eric Doerr, VP of Engineering and Cloud Security at Google Cloud, Gil Shwed, founder and CEO of Check Point; Aviv Cohen, CMO of Pentera; Bret Arsenault, corporate vice president and chief information security officer of Microsoft; Udi Mokady, founder and executive chairman of CyberArk; Chris Roberts, CISO of Boom Supersonic; Lane Bess, CEO of Deep Instinct and others.

The conference took place amidst the backdrop of rapid AI development, the Ukrainian crisis and an alarming rise in cybercrime and cyber-related damages, which are projected to reach an annual cost of $10.5tn by 2025.

While concerns about the impact of AI across sectors, including cybersecurity, were discussed, speakers also expressed optimism about the transformative potential of this technology in addressing cybersecurity challenges.

Dr Al Kuwaiti discussed the importance of allies, detailing how Israel recently helped the UAE fend off a serious DDoS cyberattack. “Thank God for the Abraham Accords… Cybersecurity is an important aspect for us all. The UAE is going through great digital transformation across all sectors: aviation, education, healthcare, oil and gas, transportation. And as a matter of fact, we need to ensure a safe and secure digital transformation.”

Dr Al Kuwaiti continued, describing how the UAE plugs into the startup nation’s many companies to build and extend his country’s “cyber dome” to defend against cyberattacks.

Read: Dr Al Kuwaiti leads UAE delegation at Cyber Week, highlighting UAE-Israel cyber alliance

Meanwhile Bar spoke at Cyber Week about how the Shin Bet is harnessing AI: “AI technology has been incorporated quite naturally into the Shin Bet’s interdiction machine.” He describes how “an alarming number of [cybersecurity cases] have a strong basis on the web – posts, inspiration, knowledge, or social groups.

The trend is clear. Traditional security organisations must adapt to the new situation, where any angry person with access to the Internet may become a threat.

Already today, with AI, we have identified a significant number of threats,” he said. “Since we have understood we can’t fight this war with sticks and stones, we recognise the threats but also see opportunities of using AI.”

The importance of global collaborations was made clear. Jones commented on the legal challenges of cybersecurity: “When people say cybercrime is borderless, that really infuriates me because, as law enforcement officials, we are totally constricted by the countries and the legislation.

“To address the problem, Interpol has teams based around the world, providing “a framework for those countries and with secure platforms for communications.”

Dunkin spoke on the importance of employing “a collective defense approach to cybersecurity.” She said: “We must cooperate with like-minded international partners, focusing on innovation and cybersecurity capacity-building measures, cybersecurity for industrial control systems, the sharing of best practices, as well as workforce development strategies and training.”