Abu Dhabi cyber offensive arm Digital 14 gets a new face: CPX
Digital 14 (Emirati Cyber Security Firm) which has contributed to Dark matter’s operations with their established vulnerabilities laboratory xen1thLabs is gradually releasing its cyber intelligence engineers. The choice was granted to the company of either leaving the firm altogether or working for a company that is still in the process of being set up, possibly under the name of CPX.
The latest development in the power struggle is taking place in the Al Nahyan clan, in which Digital 14 is about to be reorganized in the form of a new Emirati cyber offensive Avatar “CPX” The Gulf Information Security Expo and Conference (GISEC conference) held from 21 to 23 March in Abu Dhabi; provide the platform to the Mohamed Hamad al-Kuwaiti (head of cybersecurity) the opportunity to make the creation of the Emirate’s new cyber offense official firm CPX. The company had no stand at the conference but facilitated a hacking contest.
The creation of Cyber Protection X Holdings (CPX) was initiated by Mohamed Hamad al-Kuwaiti. The new conglomerate CPX is appropriating Emirati semi-public company Digital 14 offensive privileges, while digital 14 continues to operate defensive tasks. The splinter is not yet been decided despite the official declaration. The firm CPX has been active for at least six months but their staffs are still a part of Digital 14.
The UAE’s publicly owned cyber corporation Digital14 had also set up its branch in India in February. In India the firm is headed by Sanjiv Jain and Deep Datta, previously both the partners we’re working for DarkMatter (a cyber Intelligence firm). Digital14 disperses the Katim protected communications system, primarily developed by DarkMatter, and operates the vulnerabilities laboratory xen1thLabs.
In past, the Firm DarkMatter shares commonalities with an Indian origin Surveillance conglomerate Agalya. The revelations made about DarkMatter in the recent past completely contradict its mission of safeguarding complex organizations. It has lately been linked to servicing offensive surveillance operations of repressive governments. Some leaked WikiLeaks show connections between DarkMatter and Indian firm “Aglaya”.
In 2016 and 2017 DarkMatter also operated a project named Raven with the help of EX-NSA operatives. The operation ran against hundreds of targets across the Middle East and Europe, counting the governments of Qatar, Yemen, Iran, and Turkey. The hackers of project Raven used karma to hack an iPhone used by sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al- Thani (Emir of Qatar).
It is speculated that changing the name of Digital 14 is just for revamping the image of the firm while its functioning would still remain the same.
