Ex- FIFA Organiser, Russia is to provide cyber aid to Qatar for secure FIFA 2021
Russia being the last host for global soccer event FIFA 2018 had witnessed large-scale malware attacks during the event. As per records it neutralised 25 million cyber attacks. Considering, the past experience of Russia, Qatar has chosen the right partner to help in securing FIFA 2021 though internal security forces of which cyber security preparedness is to be an important segment.
As per reports, the Rosgvardia, which is headed by Viktor Zolotov’s Kremlin rising star is giving Qatar the benefit of its intelligence and Special Forces branch. It is to provide Qatari forces, medical, tactical, combating, diving, cyber operations and all over strategy of engineering security precautions.
Rosgvardia, Russia’s National Guard, is known for its special capability that performs cyber security and cyber intelligence functions to monitor and analyse online networks. It is well equipped to launch both offensive and defensive cyber operations.
Such a capable association with Rosgvardia will certainly help Qatar in upgrading its cyber capabilities and honing both its offensive and defensive cyber capabilities.
In the last two months, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov visited UAE, Saudi Arabia and Qatar. This is a clear sign that indicates Russia is interested not just establishing good relations with one power bloc but also had an eye to create its technological dependencies in the region in exchange for some control over region’s oil and gas supplies as it has a vital stake in the future of the global oil and gas marketplace.
Qatar being is one of the smallest states in the Middle East, surrounded by much larger natural resources and powers hence, in order to protect Qatar’s sovereignty and security, officials in Doha have historically depended upon foreign support for defense.
Few months back, Investment Promotion Agency Qatar (IPA Qatar) had announced signing of three Memorandum of Understanding (MoUs) with Russian entities on the sidelines of the 24th edition of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF), held in Russia.
BI.ZONE, a Russia based cyber company has associated with Qatar helps to increase protection against cybercriminals in the Middle East with the help of Russian technologies. BI.ZONE plans to supply the Qatari market with several solutions. One of them is BI.ZONE Cloud Fraud Prevention for countering fraudulent transactions in digital banking channels.
BI.ZONE provides services like penetration testing, malware analysis, incident management which was sufficient for Qatar to build their offensive cyber capabilities and safeguard them from potential cyber risk.
Qatar is looking to enhance its cyber operations given the volatile situation it had been facing in the region. It is also trying to train its cyber departments with the help of these new associations in order to deal with the rising cyber security challenges.
