GISEC Global 2026 opens in Dubai as world's cyber leaders unite against threats

Dubai: Every second you spend reading this sentence, the UAE has already blocked another cyberattack. Roughly 416 of them tick by every second, about 25,000 an hour, some 600,000 a day, according to figures Gulf News reported last month. Today, the professionals whose job it is to stop those attacks has touched down at the Dubai Exhibition Centre.

GISEC Global 2026, the Middle East and Africa's largest cybersecurity event, has just opened today at the Dubai Exhibition Centre, Expo City Dubai, under the theme "Cyber First: The New Digital Order." Now in its 15th edition, the event runs until September 18 and is expected to draw more than 25,000 cybersecurity professionals, over 750 exhibiting brands, 350-plus expert speakers, and participants from more than 180 countries.

AI will be a main topic

GISEC Global is hosted by the UAE Cyber Security Council, with the Dubai Electronic Security Center (DESC) as official Government Cybersecurity Partner, and support from the Ministry of Interior and Dubai Police. This year's headline addition is the Cyber First Global Summit, bringing together ministers, central bank governors, national cyber authorities and global tech CEOs to discuss how cybersecurity, economic stability and national security are becoming inseparable.

As ransomware campaigns are now fully AI-assisted, with malware increasingly able to rewrite its own code to dodge detection, and deepfakes being a growing issue too, this year's edition focuses on artificial intelligence, as a weapon, target, and threat.

Some of the speakers of the day include Dr. Mohamed Al Kuwaiti, Head of UAE Cyber Security Council, Amer Ashraf, CEO of Cyber Security Systems and Services Sector (DESC), Subra Kumaraswamy, senior vice president and chief Information Security Officer (CISO) at Visa, Alex Attumalil,  Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) at Under Armour and Roeland Delrue, co-founder of Aikido Security, Europe's fastest-growing cybersecurity company.

"Our first line of defence is still and yet is the community," says H.E. Dr. Mohamed Al Kuwaiti, speaking at GISEC 2026.

According to him, preparing for future conflict includes migrating to post-quantum cryptography and designing security into smart cities and essential services from the start.

"You will hear as well many announcements about bringing all of our community together: women, youth, kids. Our curriculums, as a matter of fact, have already embedded so many things in the cyber domain. With the AI now in everybody's hand, we need to ensure the culture of cyber security, (sic)"

Expectations for this years GISEC

Trends and risks associated with AI in cyber security is one of the topics, that people are interested to learn more about today. One of them who find that interesting is Brian Sullivan, who is attending GISEC today.

"I am interested to hear from many speakers here today about the trends, they are seeing particularly with the use of AI to protect the enterprises, but also understand the risks that AI poses as well," he said.

Data sovereignty is also one of the topics being mentioned as a key concern. That is what visitor Erduan Hoxha said to Gulf News today.

"Basically, I am here to create relationships with the people to see the main challenges around cyber security. Data sovereignty is a key thing," he said.

For others this is their first time attending GISEC, Farisa Khan is one of them, and she is here today to explore and understand more about the increasing accessibility of hacking tools due to AI.

"I feel like we need obviously a lot more security than usual, as a lot of people even with no experience can get into hacking. That is a serious threat," she expressed.