Securing the Middle East’s New AI Workforce: A Critical Cybersecurity Imperative

As governments and businesses deploy autonomous AI agents, security leaders must embed protection from the start to safeguard data and operations.

The Middle East’s ambitious push to become a global AI leader is entering a new phase with the rise of “agentic AI”—autonomous systems capable of making decisions and performing tasks without human intervention. According to Gartner, by 2028, one-third of enterprise applications will include such AI, handling 15% of daily work decisions.

While these AI agents promise to revolutionize sectors from healthcare to finance, they also introduce significant cybersecurity challenges, particularly in a region with strict data sovereignty laws. In the UAE and Saudi Arabia—both investing heavily in national AI infrastructure—security teams must now plan not only for human and traditional digital threats, but for securing an autonomous AI workforce.

New Risks in a Regulated Landscape
Agentic AI will operate in environments governed by regulations such as the UAE’s Personal Data Protection Law and oversight from Saudi Arabia’s SDAIA. These frameworks impose strict data localization and transfer rules, especially in sensitive sectors.

“Security leaders need full visibility over AI agent deployments to prevent ‘shadow AI’ from emerging,” says Hadi Zakhem, VP for Middle East, Turkey, and Africa at Netskope. “Being involved from the earliest stages is the best way to ensure security is inherent to operations.”

AI agents, if over-permissioned or poorly monitored, could be exploited to access sensitive data, disrupt systems, or even interfere with other AI agents—a particular concern in Saudi Arabia, which recorded over 270,000 DDoS attack attempts in the first half of 2025 alone.

A Multi-Pronged Security Approach
To secure AI agents, organizations must adopt several key practices:

• Implement strict access controls and avoid over-permissioning.
• Continuously monitor AI behavior for anomalies.
• Encrypt data used by AI agents and validate inputs and outputs to prevent adversarial attacks.
• Conduct regular security audits and penetration testing specific to AI systems.

National strategies such as the UAE’s National Cybersecurity Strategy and Saudi Arabia’s Essential Cybersecurity Controls provide a foundation, but businesses must ensure AI deployments align with these evolving frameworks.

Collaboration and Preparedness
As Gulf nations harmonize AI ethics and security standards through initiatives like Bahrain’s GCC AI Ethics programme, cross-border cooperation will be essential. For now, experts stress that securing AI agents starts with involving cybersecurity teams at the planning stage—treating each AI agent with the same rigor as a new human employee.

With the right safeguards, the Middle East can harness agentic AI’s potential without compromising security or compliance.