Securing the Region’s Digital Transformation is Key Focus for Trend Micro at GITEX

(MENAFNEditorial) Trend Micro releases August threat data for Middle East and North Africa, showing that threat activity continues to be active.

DUBAI, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES, October 13, 2018 - Trend Micro Incorporated (TYO: 4704; TSE: 4704), a global leader in cybersecurity solutions, while continuing to observe increased threat activity across Middle East and North Africa (MENA), is stressing the importance of cybersecurity for digital transformation at GITEX 2018. The event is taking place at the Dubai World Trade Center from 14 to 18 October 2018, and Trend Micro’s booth is located at Sheikh Rasheed Hall.

Leveraging its Smart Protection Network™ (SPN), the company found that the MENA region continued to be hit by malware and vulnerabilities. SPN is a global network of threat intelligence sensors with continually updated email, web, and file reputation databases in the cloud. Globally, SPN has 250 million sensors, processing more than three trillion threat queries and blocking 65 billion threats on a yearly basis. SPN blocked 12% more threats in August than in July across the world.

In the MENA region, SPN blocked more than 591,000 malware attempts in August alone. The United Arab Emirates (UAE) was hit the hardest, with 206,056 attempts detected, followed by Saudi Arabia (192,787). Email threats are prevalent too, with almost 20 million blocked. Saudi Arabia (more than 8.5 million) and North Africa (more than 7.4 million) bore the brunt of it. The region also suffered from 375,861 mobile threats. Egypt ranked number one with 87,151 mobile threats detected and blocked, followed by the UAE (79,532).

Globally, Trend Micro’s Zero Day Initiative (ZDI), the world’s largest vendor-agnostic bug bounty program, discovered a total of 105 vulnerabilities in August, a significant drop from 273 in July. However, the vulnerabilities found in Microsoft software more than doubled in August, from 7 to 16. Adobe vulnerabilities declined sharply from 68 in July to only four in August. Thirty-two SCADA vulnerabilities were found in August-a big jump from only one in July. Good news is no zero-day vulnerability was uncovered in the same month.

Trend Micro’s ZDI employs more than 3,000 researchers worldwide, who are devoted to discovering and responsibly disclosing zero-day vulnerabilities. Since its inception in 2005, ZDI has found and published more than 4,500 vulnerabilities and paid over $17 million to researchers. Vulnerability intelligence is shared with Trend Micro’s network defense solutions, and as a result, our customers are protected 72 days on average before an official patch becomes available in the market.

Vulnerabilities in software and hardware can be attacked by exploit kits. In August, Trend Micro blocked a total of 124 exploit kit attempts in MENA, 52 in North Africa and 72 in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) excluding Qatar.

Globally, from January 2016 to August 2018, Trend Micro blocked more than 1.8 billion ransomware attempts, with Asia and Middle East accounting for more than 44% of all such attempts, followed by Americas (more than 32%), Europe (almost 15%), Africa (more than 4%), and Oceania (more than 1%).

“At Trend Micro, we have one of the industry’s best research teams and intelligence databases. As a result, our solutions and technologies are continuously updated with the singular objective of protecting our customers better”, commented Dr. Moataz Bin Ali, Vice President, Middle East and North Africa, Trend Micro.

“As the region continues its massive digital transformation, businesses are inevitably exposed to growing threats, vulnerabilities, and data breaches. Digital transformation cannot be pursued at the expense of cybersecurity. At GITEX, we want to show the region how Trend Micro can help secure the digital journey any business has embarked on, and provide the visibility needed in managing an increasingly complex IT environment.”

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