Alessandro Bassano
Principal Digital Security Scientist, Technology Innovation Institute Abu Dhabi
Alessandro Bassano is Principal Security Research Scientist at the Digital Security Research Centre (DSRC), at Abu Dhabi’s Technology Innovation Institute (TII). In this role, he carries out research in the field of embedded systems and focuses on firmware and hardware systems vulnerabilities. Bassano brings to his role more than 30 years of experience in the cyber security sector and keeps up to date on the latest research developments through his extensive reading and mentoring on the subject.
Ali Abdulla Al Sadadi
Head of IT, Ministry of Oil, Bahrain
He carries 17+ Years of experience in the Information Technology & DX. Working in the Ministry of Oil in Bahrain as Head of IT. Working with Digital Transformation, Cybersecurity, Cloud Transformation, and passionate with IT Service Management with ITIL Framework.
Ali Alamadi
CEO & Co-Founder, CyberArrow
Ali Alamadi has more than 14 years’ experience in the cybersecurity field. He has been focusing on supporting the government with establishing their cybersecurity programs. He has been selected to represent the UAE in SC 27 working group in ISO SC 27 working group which is responsible for drafting and publishing many information security standards such as ISO 27001. In his past experiences, he lead many cybersecurity projects for implementing various standards such as ISO 27001 and ISO 22301 as well as local standards such as UAE IA and ISR.
Ali Juma AlAjme
Director of Digital Health Department, Ministry of Health and Prevention – UAE
Amit Mehta
Cybersecurity Advisory Practice Lead, Mastercard
Biju Hameed
Heads of Business Technology Infrastructure & Operations practice, Dubai Airports
Biju Hameed CISSP CISM CISA CRISC CCSP MBCS is a seasoned cybersecurity professional and international speaker with two decades of extensive experience in the areas of cybersecurity management & technology operations , 13 years of which has been in Aviation cybersecurity. He currently heads the Business Technology Infrastructure & Operations practice at a Dubai Airports spending a considerable amount of time and focus on IT/OT Security. Biju holds a Master’s degree (with distinction) in Network Security and has several professional certifications to his credit. He has also been a featured speaker and panelist at several regional and international events for over a decade now.
Charanjeet Singh
Sr. Vice President & Head - Fraud Risk & Investigation, First Abu Dhabi Bank
Charanjeet is an anti-fraud professional with 24 years of experience in the financial services and baking sector. He has worked in India, Tanzania and is working in UAE since 2010. Charanjeet holds CFE, CAMS and CISM certification from ACFE, ACAMS and ISACA respectively. He works with First Abu Dhabi Bank as Head of Group Fraud Risk & Investigation division where he is responsible for fraud prevention & investigations for the FAB group in UAE and international offices. Charanjeet is Chairperson of Fraud Prevention Committee of UAE Bank’s Federation (UBF), in this role he works with UBF to implement anti-fraud framework in UAE banking sector. Charanjeet is also part of MENA Regional management committee of The Association of Corporate Investigators (ACI).
Prof. Dusko Tomic
Program Director - Master of Arts in Security and Strategic Studies, College of Security and Global Studies, American university in the Emirates
Professor Dusko Tomic is a full Professor in the College of Security and Global Studies, American University in the Emirates. His research interests include security and risk management, where he has more than 20 years of experience in the area of disaster and risk prevention and sanitation, and risk management of emergency situations.. He completed his Doctoral degree in Political Sciences and graduated from Belgrade University in 2009. Professor Tomic is the author of nine monography and published books and over 30 peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters related to security, terrorism, intelligence system and emergency management.
Dr. Eldar Saljic
Program Director/College of Security and Global Studies, American university in the Emirates
Prof. Ernesto Damiani
Senior Director of Robotics and Intelligent Systems Institute, Khalifa University
He is also a Professor in the Electrical and Computer Engineering department and Director of the Khalifa University Center for Cyber Physical Systems (C2PS). Dr. Damiani is the Chair of the Information Security Program and a Research Professor in EBTIC. He is on extended leave from the Department of Computer Science, Università degli Studi di Milano, Italy, where he leads the SESAR research lab.
Dr. Fouad Abou Chacra
Senior Specialist Special Projects and Innovation, and Senior Manager OT Security Operations, Dubai Electricity and Water Authority
Dr. Fouad Abou Chacra holds a PhD from Université de Paris/Supélec-France in electrical engineering, has occupied contractor and consultant positions in several companies such as Consolidated Contractors Company, AREVA T&D, Electricité de France and currently works for Dubai Electricity and Water Authority as Senior Specialist Special Projects and Innovation, and Senior Manager OT Security Operations.
He is a Certified PMP, ASQ Six Sigma Green Belt, EFQM Assessor, CISM and CISSP. Throughout his career, he created new functional/business units, managed and successfully delivered infrastructure mega-projects focusing on substation automation systems, smart grids, cyber security, wide area monitoring systems, digital transformation in addition to designing and implementing frameworks for project, quality, excellence and innovation management.
Gina Osborn
FBI Assistant Special Agent in Charge, (Retired) I President, Gina L. Osborn & Associates
Glen Thomas
Technology & Cyber Practice Partner, Grant Thornton
Glen is the Technology and Cyber practice Partner at Grant Thornton UAE leading the Grant Thornton team to deliver Digital and Cyber Transformation projects across the UAE.
Glen has over 20 years’ experience in delivering Technology Transformation, Information Security/Cyber and Risk projects for Government, Defence, Energy, Telco and Finance Sectors. Throughout his professional career Glen has been involved with standards and regulatory bodies in developing policies aligned with risk, resource management as well as technology adoption security thought leadership. This is supported by his experience working with leading edge technologies and implementing strategies for the adoption of these technologies from a business transformation and security perspective.
In addition to his technology experience, Glen also has successfully delivered Cyber and Security focused strategic leadership, Information, Technology and Security Risk Management, Threat Intelligence, Cyber, and Biometrics projects for Government, Defence, Aviation, and Security Sector.
Prior to joining Grant Thornton, Glen led the Cyber practice for a global consulting firm in Saudi Arabia in addition to leading transformation and cyber establishment projects for senior government departments at a national level.
Glen has worked with clients in the Asia-Pac, US, UK, EU, and Middle East and broader MENA region including Saudi Arabia, UAE, Egypt and Jordan.
Gregory D Evans
Ethical Hacker & Director, National Cyber Security Ventures, USA
While other cyber security experts received their knowledge from college classrooms, Mr. Evans learned from real world experience. Mr. Evans became a hacker-for-hire in middle school. By the time he was in his twenties, he ran a million dollar a week business before the FBI shut down his hi-tech criminal empire. Soon after, he turned from criminal to cyber security expert.
In the last 20 years, Mr. Evans has taken 4 cyber security companies public on the stock market specializing in penetration testing, cyber blackmail/extortion and training.
Mr. Evans clients are not like traditional clients of cyber security experts, but athletes, entertainers, politicians, law firms, small business to corporation around the world.
Over 20 million people have seen Mr. Evans on television as a commentator on CNN, Fox News, ABC News, Al Jazeera, BBC, History Channel, CBS News, NBC News, CNBC, US Weekly, and TRT World, among many others.
Dr. Haitham Al Hakmani
Director, Emergency Management, Ministry of Health Oman
An energetic, ambitious person who has developed a mature and responsible approach to any task and undertakes situation that he is presented with. As a graduate with ten years’ experience in the medical field as an emergency Doctor and six years in emergency & Disaster management, he is excellent at working with others to achieve a certain objective on time and with excellence.
LT. COL. Dr. Hamad Khalifa Al Nueimi
Head of Telecommunications Section Information Technology Center, Abu Dhabi Police General Head Quarter
LT. COL. Dr. Hamad Khalifa Al Nueimi has attended more than 100+ events, workshops and conferences internally and externally and most of them were about Network Security and telecommunication as well as cyber security. However, his responsibility at AD police GHQ as telecom section manager make me always busy, he also does have other role as a telecom committee manager for most of the events around AD city such as , Grand Prix Formula One event. He is the founder of “Digital Barza“ which has more than 100+ members to accelerate the process of sharing and exchanging the knowledge.
Hani Bani Amer
Head Cyber Security Operations, National Critical Infrastructure, Dubai
A well-rounded and highly accomplished certified security leader with about 20 years of experience, he is coming with various security background with solid and progressive experience in security administration, security operations, security architecture, security program management and risk management.
Dr. Hossam Elshenraki
Associate Professor, Dubai Police HQ
Dr. Humaid Alshamsi
Director of Artificial Intelligence Application, Abu Dhabi Police
He is a director of the Artificial Intelligence applications at Abu Dhabi Police, also he served a number of entities in the Strategic management and performance development as Information Technology Expert. Dr.Alshamsi has a wide range research interests and publishes such as digital signal processing, machine learning, human computer interaction, computer vision, embedded systems and communications, and he gives more than 40 speeches in AI and IoT local and international events since 2017.
Dr. Hussain Aldawood
Director of Engineering & Cyber Security, GNS
Irina Albanese
Head of Innovation Middle East & Africa, DHL
Jan Fox
Executive Director, REACH Council for Safe Communities
John Cowling
Specialist in Security across Critical Infrastructure and Transport sectors
Khalid Ansari
Principal Cybersecurity Engineer, FM Approvals
Dr. Khalil Ramadi
Director of the Laboratory for Advanced, Neuroengineering and Translational Medicine, New York University (NYU)
Kris Voorspels
Director of International Technical Services , Owl Cyber Defense
Served as Deputy Project Director at Siemens NATO team. Architect of industrial network security projects with Aramco, Bapco and Adnoc. Part of an award winning green energy project.
Malek Abu Tayah
IT/OT Manager, SUEZ Middle East & Central Asia
He has 16+ years’ experience in operations and security covering both IT & OT. Focusing on developing and guiding the implementation of the company's Industrial Control Systems (ICS) security programs.
Dr. Marwan Al Zarouni
Director of Information Services Department, Dubai Electronic Security Center (DESC)
His Excellency Dr. Mohamed Al-Kuwaiti
Head of Cyber Security, United Arab Emirates Government
Muhammad Ali Azeem
Senior Infrastructure & Cyber Security Consulting Engineer, Sharjah Electricity and Water (SEWA)
Having worked across multiple industries such as Oil & Gas, Retail, Aviation, Energy, and Utilities, Ali has over 12 years' experience in Cyber Security and IT Infrastructure. He specializes in providing businesses with expert strategic support to improve their information security and operational IT landscapes. At the moment, he is leading his company's digital transformation journey in a role of Technology Architect and assisting in the adoption of the most effective, secure and efficient business solutions that will lead to its move towards progressive and innovative business practices.
Nayaz Mohammed
Partner, PWC
Nayaz is a partner based in Oman for 22+ years and has extensive experience in advising Government sector in eServices Transformation. He was the leader for SOC and Resilience Services across the Middle East and North African Region prior to joining PWC. He was involved in various information security related engagements and IT risk, governance and controls related engagements. He also was Leader for SOC and Resilience Services in a Big 4 firm across the Middle East Region prior to joining PWC.
Dr. Patrick Noack
Executive Director, Future, Foresight and Imagination, Dubai Future Foundation
Patrick is Executive Director: Future, Foresight and Imagination, at the Dubai Future Foundation, where he manages three teams: Dubai Future Research is the research arm of the foundation and provides thought leadership on emerging technologies, social impacts and cross-domain topics; Dubai Future Councils which were established to explore how 13 key sectors could be re-imagined to be fit for the future; the World Economic Forum’s UAE Center for the Fourth Industrial Revolution which develops policy-oriented research in the 4IR domains of relevant to the UAE.
Prof. Paul Poteete
PhD, Associate Professor, Computer Science and Cybersecurity, Geneva College
Richard Flint
Technical and Commercial Lead, Physical Security
Richard is one of the UK’s leading experts in physical security standards, having over 24 years’ experience managing testing and certification of security products and research projects for a variety of stakeholders. Richard’s responsibilities have included managing the delivery of security R&D programmes, guidance, standards and associated technical support services for a range of external stakeholders, including UK Government; developing certification schemes; delivering training on forced entry protection; and overseeing the evaluation and certification of countless physical security products used to protect critical infrastructure and other assets around the world.
Richard is passionate about the role standards, testing and certification can play in delivering certainty to those who specify and use security equipment. In addition to preparing and maintaining several Loss Prevention Standards, including LPS1175, Richard has contributed to the work of several British, European and ASTM standards committees. These cover a broad spectrum of product types and performance issues, including forced entry protection, vehicle impact resistance and asset marking.
Dr. Sandro Gaycken
Director, Digital Society Institute
Dr Sandro Gaycken is founder and director of the Digital Society Institute at ESMT Berlin. He has published five scientific monographs, three on cyberwarfare, and more than 60 other scientific publications on cybersecurity. Sandro is an Oxford Martin School Fellow, a program committee member of Harvard-MIT’s annual conference series on cyber defense and cyber norms, a Senior Advisor for the AI Initiative at Harvard Kennedy School, co-lead “Programme Transverse Sécurité Défense, Sec. Cybersecurity” at elite French university CNAM, an EastWest Senior Fellow, a Senior Fellow of the German Council on Foreign Relations, a member of the Conversation Circle Intelligence Services in Germany, and an IEEE permanent reviewer.
Shahab Siddiqui
Global Head of Cyber Security, Petrofac
Shahab Siddiqui, Global Head of Cyber Security, at Petrofac a leading service provider to the oil and gas production and processing industry. He is a Cyber Security professional with more than a decade of extensive experience working in various domains of Information Security, defining and delivering Information Security strategies in complex enterprise environments. His expertise includes SOC operations, Incident Handling, Information Security Risk – Governance & Compliance, ISMS Auditing & implementation, and PCI DSS.
Sharief Fahmy
Executive Director, Kaman Corporation
Simon Bell
Senior Vice President – MENA, Marsh Middle East and Africa
Simone Vernacchia
Partner, Digital, Cyber Security, Resilience and Infrastructure, PwC Middle East
Simon Whitehouse
Managing Director, SGW
Smith Gonsalves
Director & Principal Consultant, CyberSmithSECURE
Smith Gonsalves is also recognised as India’s One of The Youngest Cyber Security Evangelist & Information Security Professional of his time, he is one the most exceptional Security Professional who has an experience of 7 + years in Security from the age of 15 to 22, where he has successfully completed Industry recognised certifications including OSCP, CISA, CCSK, TOGAF, CHFI, CEH & CEH Practical v10. Along with this Smith is also a Cert-IN Empanelled Auditor for the Company PrimeInfoServ as an Security Consultant. Smith has been awarded the CIO1000 Award 2021 by Enterprise IT World also, recognised as Cyber Soldier 2021 by CyberFrat.
Dr. Spateeka Prakash Kalkunte
Head Medical Affairs & Quality, Aster DM Healthcare
Sultan Altukhaim
Chief Information Security and Risk Officer, The Saudi Investment Bank
Sultan has an extensive IT and Information Security professional experience locally and internationally. Sultan has worked in the past for Saudi Airlines, Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency (SAMA), Saudi Telecom Company (STC), Florida Tech (USA), Boeing (USA), and Innovative Solutions (IS). Sultan has earned his B.Sc. and M.Sc. in Information Systems from King Saud University, and his second M.Sc. in Engineering Management, and Ph.D. in Computer Science from Florida Institute of Technology.
Taha Hussain
Senior Security Engineer, Dubai Electricity & Water Authority - DEWA
A seasoned IT security professional, Taha has a post graduate degree in Computer and systems security from University of Greenwich, London. He has earned many reputed industry certifications including CCIE-security and CISA. Taha reports to CISO, and is currently architecting and leading information security projects at DEWA.
Tarik Abdulaal
Vice President MEA, Former Gulf Supply Chain Director, Slimstock, Proctor & Gamble
Tonu Tammer
Executive Director, CERT-EE
Tõnu started working in his current position as Executive Director of CERT-EE more than 3 years ago. He has taken a very strong stand in cutting the threat landscape and making Estonian cyberspace more resilient to cyber attacks. Before taking the current position, he has worked in the field of IT and internal security for over 10 years in total: most under the Ministry of Home Affairs. During that time he has held various key positions in IT for the Home Affairs: Chief Strategy Officer (CSO) and Chief Quality Officer (CQO) dealing with the long-term strategic planning and finances of IT systems and their quality.
William Brown
Director, Crisis and Resilience Consulting, Middle East, Control Risks
William leads Control Risks’ crisis and resilience consulting team in the Middle East from our Dubai office. He has worked in risk management, business continuity, crisis management and IT disaster recovery, cyber and resilience since 1997. William has been based in Dubai for the last three years working extensively across the Middle East and North Africa, Europe, Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa.
Yegor Aushev
Yosi Shavit
Head of ICS Cyber Security Department, Israel Ministry of Environmental Protection