Why cybersecurity is now a CEO problem in the Middle East – Fast Company Middle East

Source Domain: fastcompanyme.com

Five years ago, cybersecurity sat largely inside the IT department while boardrooms focused on expansion, inflation, and market share.

Today, many CEOs recognize that the biggest threat to business continuity may come from invisible weaknesses buried inside code, algorithms, cloud infrastructure, and connected vendor networks.

What has changed is not only the scale of attacks but also the realization that a digital failure can threaten the survival of the enterprise itself.

The numbers underscore the shift. A 2026 Heidrick & Struggles survey found that nearly half of Middle East business leaders now rank cybersecurity as the single greatest organizational risk facing their companies, significantly higher than the global average.

Meanwhile, PwC’s latest Middle East Digital Trust Insights report revealed that 62% of organizations across the region expect cybersecurity budgets to increase this year, reflecting the rapid shift in digital resilience from an operational concern to a strategic priority.

These changes are fundamentally transforming the CEO’s role as cybersecurity becomes more important.

THE RISE OF THE “ALWAYS-ON” CRISIS

Digital threats exist as a permanent operating condition.

Executives now govern in a state of continuous vulnerability, where attacks can emerge from anywhere: hostile actors, rogue insiders, AI-generated fraud, infrastructure failures, or even trusted third-party vendors.

Today, cybersecurity briefings are no longer annual formalities. They are recurring agenda items. Chief information security officers increasingly sit alongside CFOs and legal advisors during strategic planning discussions. Some companies are even restructuring governance models entirely, creating dedicated technology and resilience committees at the board level.

“One of the most persistent misconceptions is that cybersecurity sits within IT, when in reality it is a business-wide imperative,” says Hadi Anwar, CEO of CPX. “AI is making today’s…

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