Letters

The Indian School Bahrain (ISB) is organising dance competitions for the public in connection with the ISB Mega Fair 2018.

The competitions will be held in Western Dance, Cinematic Dance and Arabic Dance in which any age group can participate.

Trophies and cash prizes will be given to the first three places in the competitions which started yesterday and will continue tomorrow and on Sunday at the school’s Isa Town campus.

Additionally, the top performers will be able to stage their dance show at the Mega Fair venue on December 20 and 21. 

The Indian School appeals to the dance enthusiasts to participate. Groups with a minimum of five members can register for the competition.

For more information, please contact the conveners Sathish Narayanan - 33368466, Ranju Nair - 33989636, Neena Gireesh - 35372012 and Shamita Surendran - 36324335.

ISB Hon Chairman Prince S Natarajan, Secretary Saji Antony, EC members Rajesh Nambiar, Deepak Gopalakrishnan and Saji George said the school is looking forward to the presence of all art lovers for the success of the dance competitions.      

The Indian School,

Kingdom of Bahrain.

Newcomers are welcome to join the Bahrain Writers’ Circle events during the month of January.

The Bahrain Writers’ Poetry Circle Meeting will take place on Wddnesday, January 9, at 7.30pm at ARTDIVANO (Gallery), Al Andalus Garden, Gudaibiya.

The Bahrain Writers’ Circle Monthly Meeting will be staged on Monday, January 14, at 7.30pm at Mannai Sea Plaza (next to Bahrain Specialist Hospital), Entertainment Centre, Mezzanine Floor, Juffair.

Finally, the Bahrain Writers’ Creative Workshop, will take place on the following Monday, January 21, at  7.30pm at The Juffair Grand Hotel Coffee Shop, Juffair.

For information about the Bahrain Writers’ Circle, kindly contact: 39574795.

Claudia Hardt, Bahrain Writers’ Circle.

Great news regarding Teddy, the rescue dog, featured in last week’s GulfWeekly.

His leg is healing so he’s out walking now and completely relaxed when on the lead, no pulling … just chilling.

His gofundme page, my sister and friends have donated enough money to send Teddy in mid-January to Canada for his forever home and I’ll be fostering him until then.

Thank you – we did it!

Ellissa, Saar.

What lies ahead for companies, governments and individuals regarding cybersecurity in 2019? Will we see the EU government forcing US data centres to hand over data? Will the European Union issue its first major fines for organisations in contravention of its General Data Protection Regulation? Will our growing dependence on social media expose us to unwanted risks as our accounts become compromised?

The World Economic Forum recently placed cyber security as the fifth biggest global risk for doing business, with 19 countries ranking it as their number one concern, including 14 in Europe and North America, as well as Japan, India, Indonesia, Singapore and the Gulf States.

As the political climate around the world continues to create volatility, growing numbers of connected global citizens will turn to the Internet to have their message heard. The growth in connected devices – from consumer wearables to industrial IoT to medical devices – is compounding the security challenge as each device represents a potential cyber security risk.

Throughout 2019, the most insidious development won’t be new attack types but rather improved execution of existing attack types, especially those delivered via email. Better social engineering, more advanced phishing attacks, increases in credential stuffing attacks, and more complicated malware with multiple stages and different form factors for transmission, will make threats incredibly tricky to detect.

Companies in particularly the Middle East and Africa often assume their security is sufficient without realising that the threat landscape is drastically shifting. This makes them easy targets for cyber criminals who tend to follow the path of least resistance. Attackers will also continue to shift their attention away from larger organisations to small and medium businesses.

Even companies with good cyber protection have little protection against the reuse of passwords that have been collected in other breaches.

The evolution of cyberattacks has also created entire ecosystems of fraud. Stolen personal health information, for example, could be used to gain insight to patients’ ailments and likely treatments. Hackers could use this information to obtain prescriptions for strictly-controlled medication that is then traded or sold illegally.

It’s no longer just about a straightforward cyberattack: cybercrime is fast becoming a trickle-down economic system with multiple layers of fraud and criminality built into its very fabric.

Artificial intelligence and machine learning will play a more prominent role as the velocity and variety of attacks makes conventional approaches – such as blacklists – outdated and ill-equipped to deal with modern cyber threats. The average phishing site, for example, is only online for a few hours.

As our world becomes increasingly digitised and connected devices continue to permeate every aspect of our daily lives, the risks posed by cybercriminals are escalating.

A large-scale attack on critical infrastructure such as energy services, water supplies or even hospitals could cause massive damage and even loss of life.

Privacy will also become a key concern: consumer connected devices such as cameras, microphones and wearables will become a major security issue as hackers discover ways to see live audio and video of unsuspecting people’s lives.

The fallout of such an incident being exposed could drastically erode trust in technology and make people treat technology with greater caution as they realise the devices they have enjoyed without concern, carry immense risk to their personal privacy and security.

Even though the threat landscape keeps changing what seems to be the common thread is that email continues to be the most common – and least protected – attack vector.

We can’t predict exactly what 2019 threats will look like, but we can predict that while email remains vulnerable it will continue to be the preferred entry point for criminals to deliver threats to your organisation.

Brian Pinnock, cybersecurity specialist at Mimecast.

IT was with understandable outrage that visitors voiced their anger over the weekend when a caged baboon was seen on display at the Farmer’s Market in Budaiya.

The animal was removed immediately when it was spotted by the market manager during one of her regular inspection tours.

The incident occurred while staff members were busy attending the official opening of the start of the season of the annual market.

The market’s management has told visitors that it will ensure that this does not happen again and that the BSPCA had been invited to visit the market this coming Saturday morning.

Animal rights activists who voiced their upset on social media have also been assured that adequate steps have been taken to make sure nothing like this happens again.

Name and address supplied.