With challenges comes creativity. Amid the world’s increasing security threats, more companies emerge to offer tools to block these threats. One of these companies is Trend Micro Saw. Its sales and customer support director, Leonardo Bonomi, said that the market is in dire need of good security solutions, noting that many of the world’s governments have shortages in security tools.

Bonomi pointed out that his company alone blocks over 73,000 malicious URLs, 334,000 mails, and 59,000 malware threats on monthly basis.

He added that the company’s Egypt’s office is considered the biggest cybersecurity office in the market, and he highlighted that education, government, manufacturing, real estate, and technology are the top five most affected sectors.

How do you see the current local market and the opportunities for investing in the data security sector?

The market is in a real need of good security solutions, as many governmental sectors have shortages in security tools and infrastructure as well.

These shortages open up many opportunities for investing in the security sector and for raising cybersecurity talents to fulfill the market’s needs, whether for Trend Micro or many other companies in the sector.

What are the most prominent investment opportunities in the data security sector?

Investing in developing anti-malware and ransomware protections, as well as advanced threat protection solutions against targeted attacks.

What are your latest data security solutions?

Trend Micro has multiple solutions that cover different protection layers. Trend Micro has released the new “Xgen platform”, which integrates the traditional anti-malware solutions with the latest innovative protection layer, such as machine learning and behavior analysis, that’s integrated with the elite advanced threat protection solutions from Trend Micro. For data centre and cloud security, Trend Micro just released the new innovative version of “Deep Security 10” that covers all the needs of the hybercloud industry.

Why did data security solutions become necessary?

Usually in Egypt, customers or enterprises pay much attention on securing their servers and hardware environment while giving less attention to data, which is the most valuable and important thing to secure.

The data from Trend Micro Smart Protection Network verifies this fact that data security has become necessary, as we were able to block more than 1.4 million threats (malicious URLs, spam, malware) in Egypt for Q1 2017.

On average, we were able to block more than 73,000 malicious URLs, more than 334,000 spam mails, and more than 59,000 malwares per month.

What are the current challenges for the data security market in Egypt?

Lack of skilled calibers and a limited budget when it comes to information infrastructure and technologies. The unparalleled growth in investments compared to the acceleration of malware families in Egypt, such as SALITY, VIRUX, and DUNIHI, which can infect files, as well as spread through network shares and removable drives (e.g., USB sticks).

On the other hand, the budget for investments in information security still is not big enough to meet the high risk blinded threat generation. So users and organizations need to plan ahead to patch their systems regularly and set proper protocols and policies in place with regard to restrictions in shared folders and device management.

Which sectors have seen a demand for data security in Egypt?

The top five most affected sectors are education, government, manufacturing, real estate, and technology.

It should be noted that education, government, and manufacturing were also among the top five sectors in 2016. It is possible that these sectors are most affected because of the nature of their networks, which may open them to vulnerabilities like legacy systems, low restrictions, and in-house programmes that may use outdated applications/APIs.

What is your plan for the Egyptian market in the coming period?

Trend Micro is adapting a new role model scenario to help the Egyptian market to recover as we launch an elite community office for Trend Micro based in Tahrir Square.

Moving towards our vision to make the world safe for exchanging digital information, we incorporate Egypt to lead cybersecurity innovation among the region in the Middle East and Africa.

Our Egypt office is now considered the biggest cybersecurity office in the market, with our engineers that have direct contact with presales, sales, technical support centre, and threat research labs to help our customers and enterprises in Egypt to establish a solid and sustainable base of security.