How cybersecurity is helping global sustainable development

How cybersecurity is helping global sustainable development

With the UAE set to host at the end of the year, significant effort across all sectors in the country is being put into contributing to local, regional and global environmental sustainability goals. Under the UAE’s presidency, this COP will bring a renewed focus to delivering tangible results in an inclusive framework. Indeed, 2023 has been named the “Year of Sustainability” in the UAE, bringing many opportunities for the private sector to contribute to new and existing initiatives, and to advance landmark frameworks such as the UAE’s Green Agenda. What’s more, the UAE has also been an early advocate of digitalising as many activities as possible to improve efficiency and advance sustainable processes. Like other industries, cybersecurity has an important role to play in contributing to these objectives at both local and global levels. This manifests in some obvious and universal practices — as well as some lesser-known innovative areas. For example, environmental health is increasingly tied to cyber command and control systems, for the simple fact that a cybersecurity failure in this field could have major societal impact. We don’t need to go far to find proof of this statement. On February 5, 2021, criminals hacked into water treatment