DUBAI, UAE — The Middle East cybersecurity market is set to grow upwards of a CAGR of 15 percent in 2023 as nearly 60 percent of organizations had increased their cybersecurity spending in 2022.
“That shows consensus and robust strategic direction. As a result, in 2023, service providers will make good headway in adopting best online practices and leave little to nothing to chance,” Abhay Pandey, Founder, and CEO at MAST Consulting Group, told TRENDS in an interview .
One of the significant repercussions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic is the increase in Internet users and social networks in the world and Saudi Arabia in particular, as several statistics for 2021 revealed a growth in the users’ number.
According to the statistics, there are reasons behind Saudis’ increasing use of the Internet and social networks. Those reasons are the Kingdom’s Vision programs that prompted telecommunications and Internet companies to provide remunerative and competitive offers that contributed to facilitating the acquisition of smartphones by Saudis and enhanced the volume and speed of digital data circulation.
In the region, and due to the pandemic, the percentage of ownership of desktop and laptop computers increased to 1.61 percent in the first half of 2021.
Saudi users in numbers
More than 35 million people live in Saudi Arabia; 57.8 percent are men, and 42.2 percent are women. Of this population, 34.84 million people use the Internet, 47.16 million use mobiles: some use both.
According to the statistics of social media users in Saudi Arabia, we find that there are 29.3 million users of the social networking site “YouTube,” 28.4 million users of “WhatsApp,” 20.3 million users of Snapchat, 14.2 million users of Twitter, and 11.6 million users of Messenger.
In addition, 12 million users of Facebook, 15.6 million users of Instagram, 25.74 million users of TikTok, 7.94 million users of Pinterest, 7.9 million users of Skype, 6.91 million users of Line, 6.56 million users of WeChat, and 6 million users They use LinkedIn, and 4.84 million people use Tomber.
Pandey said, “Unsurprisingly, the social media usage levels haven’t reduced dramatically since the post-pandemic reopening, alluding to a more structural tailwind for those platforms. Additionally, social media activity in the GCC region was at an all-time high during the FIFA World Cup”.
The momentum continues beyond the event because social media platforms are designed for hyper-engagement. So, they represent ample opportunities for digital-first businesses in 2023 and the foreseeable future, according to Pandey.
UAE users and popular apps
According to a report published by “Global Media Insight,” there would be 38.63 million social media accounts in the United Arab Emirates by the beginning of 2022. In addition, between 2020 and 2022, 95 thousand new Internet users would sign up in the UAE, bringing the total number of Internet users in the country to 99 percent.
According to the data, YouTube is the most popular social media platform, followed by Facebook and Tik Tok. LinkedIn comes in at number four, and Instagram at number five.
Simply:
- Topping the list of most popular UAE social media sites and apps is YouTube, with 91.1% and 9.06 million users, followed by Facebook (72.4%) and its 7.2 million active accounts, and Tik Tok (62.4%).
- The “LinkedIn” app, which has 5.7 million users, and the “Instagram” app, which has 52.8 million users, tied for fifth place.
- The sixth position went to the “Snapchat” app with 32.7 percent and 3.25 million users, while the seventh place went to the “Twitter” app with 24.6 percent and 2.45 million tweets.
The Communications and Digital Government Regulatory Authority reported in its 2021 annual achievements say that the number of Internet users in the United Arab Emirates had reached 9.94 million by the end of the previous year, with residents spending an average of 7.24 hours per day on the Internet, of which 1.57 hours were spent on social media. In addition, about 3.25 hours per week are allotted to checking social media, and 1.75 hours are devoted to reading the news.
Investing in online safety
Pandey said, “The 100 percent internet penetration in economies such as the UAE and KSA has contributed to the surge in social media usage in the region”.
“Social media is increasingly becoming a microcosm of our natural world, with one-stop offerings such as shopping, entertainment, infotainment, and education. And users, for their part, are assimilating well into this hyper-digital reality. In addition, the pandemic has catalyzed the surge of social media usage, as shelter-in-place measures restricted physical interactions,” he added.