Saudi Cyber Market Grows as Digital Services Expand

Saudi Arabia’s cybersecurity market grew 10.7 percent last year to SR16.3 billion, or $4.35 billion, as businesses and government agencies spent more to protect their digital systems. The figure appears in the National Cybersecurity Authority’s Key Economic Indicators in the Cybersecurity Sector 2026 report, released as the Kingdom moves more public life online.

The growth reaches beyond the balance sheet. When a hospital, ministry or utility moves records and services onto networks, the people relying on those services face the risk if systems fail or attackers breach them. A larger defense market can absorb more of that risk before it reaches ordinary users, which makes the figures worth examining closely.

Who Is Paying for Protection

Private companies accounted for 69 percent of the market, or SR11.2 billion. Government entities spent about SR5.1 billion, the other 31 percent. The split shows that much of the defensive work now rests with firms running banks, retailers and logistics networks, not just the state.

The report also counted the people doing that work. Saudi Arabia’s cybersecurity workforce topped 22,000 professionals in 2025, growing at a compound annual rate of approximately 5.9 percent between 2023 and 2025. Women made up 33 percent of that workforce, compared with a global average of around 22 percent. That’s one of the report’s few workforce measures that exceeds the international benchmark.

Digital Government and the Pressure It Creates

The expansion follows the Kingdom’s push to digitize public services under Vision 2030. The Digital Government Strategy for 2025 to 2030 aims to contribute an estimated cumulative SR11.4 billion to gross domestic product and create more than 26,000 jobs by 2030. It also seeks to provide integrated digital services and improve government efficiency, increasing the need to protect public-sector systems and the personal data they hold.

The National Cybersecurity Authority launched its CyberIC program in 2022 to develop national capabilities, localize technologies and training content, and encourage domestic industry. The agency said the sector contributed approximately SR20 billion to the Kingdom’s GDP at current prices in 2025, with a compound annual growth rate of 13.2 percent between 2023 and 2025. Those contributions represented 0.42 percent of total GDP and 0.71 percent of non-oil GDP.

Voices From the Industry

Mohamad Hashem, general manager for Saudi Arabia and Bahrain at Kaspersky, told Arab News that increasingly sophisticated attacks were making cybersecurity a strategic business priority. “This is driving greater investment in security solutions that can help businesses identify threats earlier, respond faster and maintain operational continuity,” Hashem said.

Economist Ahmad Chreim described the global picture in sharper terms. Worldwide security spending is projected to reach between $240 billion and $308 billion in 2026, he said, as artificial intelligence increases cyber risks while also strengthening defenses. “Emerging markets, including the Middle East, are seeing some of the fastest growth rates globally as they build security-first infrastructure from the ground up rather than retrofitting legacy systems, a genuine opportunity for the region to leapfrog rather than play catch-up,” Chreim said.

Hashem also stressed the human side of operational security. Protecting operational technology, he said, is essential to keeping operations and supply chains running. “Strong cybersecurity defences can give businesses the confidence to launch digital services and expand their operations, making it an important foundation for sustainable growth,” he said.

The report’s product breakdown shows where the money goes. Products brought in SR8.3 billion, or 51 percent, of the market, while services accounted for SR7.9 billion, or 49 percent. Endpoint security, network security, cybersecurity operations and data security ranked among the most in-demand offerings. The National Cybersecurity Authority said it drew on stakeholders from government, private firms, academic institutions and security professionals, and classified more than 100 products and services across five main categories and 25 activities.

Why This Matters: A market growing faster than the economy signals that digital systems now carry more of daily life, from government records to household bank accounts. The spending largely targets protection for those systems, a necessary response to real threats. But the report measures dollars and jobs, not results for people whose data and services are at stake. Whether that growth means fewer breaches, faster recovery and stronger safeguards for ordinary users will depend on how the sector governs its investment, how clearly it reports results, and whether protections keep pace with the systems they’re meant to defend.