Google Cloud has set the end of 2027 as its first major deadline for protecting customer workloads and sensitive data flows against attacks enabled by future quantum computers, marking a significant step in its wider plan to make its cloud infrastructure post-quantum ready by 2029. The timetable places so-called “store now, decrypt later” attacks at the front of the company’s security migration. Under that threat model, attackers […]
Arabian Post Staff -Dubai Dubai stocks ended lower on Friday as disappointing corporate earnings and escalating tension around the Strait of Hormuz weighed on investor sentiment, while Abu Dhabi’s benchmark managed a marginal gain. The Dubai Financial Market’s main index fell 0.4%, extending losses for a second consecutive session. Air Arabia and contractor ALEC Holdings were among the biggest drags after their quarterly results disappointed investors. Emaar […]
The UAE has strongly condemned Iran over attacks on two ADNOC-affiliated vessels travelling through the Strait of Hormuz, describing the strikes as a serious violation of international maritime rules and a threat to regional and global energy security. The vessels were attacked on the evening of Thursday, August 13, while transiting the strategically important waterway. No crew members were injured and the situation aboard the ships was […]
The FBI and NCAA have launched a joint effort to protect college athletes from hackers seeking private images and using stolen material for sexual exploitation, blackmail and online harassment. The initiative follows growing concern that athletes’ highly visible digital profiles are giving criminals more opportunities to identify targets, compromise accounts and obtain intimate photographs or videos. Attackers commonly use phishing messages, stolen or guessed passwords and PINs, […]
Standard Chartered has initiated coverage of Chainlink’s LINK token with a price forecast of $200 by the end of 2030, betting that rapid expansion in tokenised assets and decentralised finance will sharply increase demand for the blockchain network’s infrastructure. The projection implies an increase of roughly 25 times from the price near $8 used when the forecast was prepared. The bank has set an interim target of […]
The Trump administration is intensifying economic pressure on Iran as Washington struggles to translate months of military operations into political concessions from Tehran. The strategy combines tighter sanctions, restrictions on oil exports and a renewed naval blockade while preserving the threat of further strikes. President Donald Trump’s government appears increasingly focused on weakening Iran’s ability to finance the state, military forces and regional operations rather than relying […]
Arabian Post Staff -Dubai Kuwait has foiled an alleged ISIS-linked plot to attack a vital facility using a specially built drone and explosives, arresting a citizen before the planned operation could be carried out. The Interior Ministry said the State Security Service uncovered the plan after intensive monitoring and surveillance. Investigators found that the suspect had received training in manufacturing explosives and drones and had constructed a […]
Cloudflare recorded a sharp escalation in high-bandwidth distributed denial-of-service attacks during the second quarter of 2026, mitigating 805 network-layer attacks that exceeded 1 terabit per second as attackers increasingly deployed overwhelming bursts of traffic against online infrastructure. The figure was more than six times the 130 terabit-scale attacks recorded during the first quarter. It brought the total number of attacks exceeding 1 Tbps during the first half […]
Iran has reshaped its military leadership around battle-tested hardliners and ordered stronger offensive capabilities as negotiations with the United States remain deadlocked, signalling that Tehran is preparing for a prolonged confrontation rather than an early settlement to the Gulf war. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei has appointed six senior commanders across the Armed Forces General Staff, Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and Basij, placing veterans with extensive operational, […]
North Korea-linked hackers exploited a previously unknown Windows vulnerability to gain the highest level of system privileges while targeting defence, aerospace and aviation organisations across several countries. The flaw, tracked as CVE-2026-68820, affects the Windows Ancillary Function Driver for WinSock, known as AFD. sys. Microsoft patched the vulnerability on August 11 after it was found being actively exploited as part of the long-running Operation Dream Job cyber-espionage […]
Dubai-based cryptocurrency exchange Bybit has filed a civil lawsuit against North Korea and the Lazarus Group over the $1.5 billion cyberattack that emptied one of its wallets in February 2025, escalating its effort to recover assets from the largest cryptocurrency theft on record. The exchange has also secured a preliminary injunction from the US District Court for the District of Columbia that freezes identified digital assets linked […]
Arabian Post Staff -Dubai Shipping through the Strait of Hormuz remains severely constrained as faltering diplomatic efforts between the United States and Iran deepen uncertainty over one of the world’s most important energy corridors. Only eight vessels were tracked transiting the strait on Tuesday, compared with a 10-day average of about 12. Seven entered through Iranian waters and only one, a coal carrier, exited. The figures followed […]
Suspected China-linked hackers used autonomous artificial intelligence agents to compromise Taiwan government systems, marking a significant escalation in the use of AI for cyber espionage and exposing how software agents can now execute complex attacks with limited human direction. The campaign unfolded over four days at the beginning of July and targeted 21 government systems. The attackers deployed as many as eight AI agents simultaneously to map […]
The compromise of LiteLLM has sharpened concerns that software underpinning artificial intelligence systems is becoming a strategic target for attackers seeking credentials, cloud access and pathways into other technology projects. Two malicious versions of the widely used LiteLLM Python package, 1.82.7 and 1.82.8, were published to the Python Package Index on March 24. They remained available for about 40 minutes before PyPI quarantined the project. The affected […]
Arabian Post Staff -Dubai Union Home Minister Amit Shah and Congress leader Rahul Gandhi found themselves at the same high-profile social gathering in New Delhi on Monday evening, even as their political confrontation over student protests continued to dominate Parliament. The two leaders attended the wedding reception of Revati Sule, daughter of NCP MP Supriya Sule and granddaughter of Sharad Pawar. The reception was held at Pawar’s […]
Arabian Post Staff -Dubai US President Donald Trump has said Washington will demand compensation from Iran as part of any future peace settlement, responding to Tehran’s call for reparations over damage caused during five months of war. Trump said the demand would cover Americans killed or seriously wounded in attacks and conflicts that Washington has blamed on Iran or Iran-backed groups over several decades. He also called […]
GitHub has expanded Dependabot malware alerts across major open-source package ecosystems, widening automated protection against compromised and deliberately malicious software dependencies beyond the npm registry. The change gives developers earlier warnings when projects depend on packages identified as malware. The expanded coverage is powered by the GitHub Advisory Database importing malicious-package intelligence from the OpenSSF Malicious Packages project. The database can now feed those records directly into […]
Turkey has signalled that Egypt could join the Mecca Joint Defence Agreement, widening a new security arrangement with Saudi Arabia and Pakistan that carries a collective-defence commitment resembling NATO’s Article 5. Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said President Recep Tayyip Erdogan wanted the three-country alliance to expand and identified Egypt as a potential participant once outstanding technical issues were resolved. His comments have shifted attention towards Cairo […]
Arabian Post Staff -Dubai US President Donald Trump has signalled that Washington is holding back from another major military escalation against Iran while allowing sanctions, a naval blockade and severe economic pressure to increase the strain on Tehran. Trump said the United States was “low-keying it” and described contacts with Tehran as only partial negotiations. His remarks indicated that the White House currently sees Iran’s worsening economic […]
The proposed allocation is expected to exceed NT$1.1 trillion, or roughly US$34 billion, when broader defence-related spending is included. The package is due to be unveiled on August 20 and will cover the armed forces as well as expenditure linked to the coast guard, veterans and special military programmes.
The increase would maintain Taiwan’s defence expenditure above 3 per cent of gross domestic product, extending a shift towards substantially higher military budgets under President Lai Ching-te. Taipei has been expanding funding for weapons, ammunition, drones, missile systems, naval platforms and military infrastructure as China strengthens its forces across the Taiwan Strait.
Taiwan’s 2026 defence expenditure calculated under a broader methodology covering coast guard spending and military pensions stands at NT$949.5 billion, equivalent to about 3.32 per cent of GDP. The Ministry of National Defence’s own allocation is NT$806 billion, NT$161.1 billion higher than the previous year.
Lai has set a longer-term objective of raising defence expenditure to 5 per cent of GDP by 2030, arguing that Taiwan must demonstrate greater capacity to defend itself while adapting to China’s rapid military expansion. The policy also responds to pressure from Washington for Taipei to shoulder a larger share of the cost of deterring an attack.
The spending expansion comes as Taiwan conducts its annual Han Kuang exercises, which this year involve large-scale simulations of invasion, blockade, cyber disruption and attacks on critical infrastructure. About 20,000 reservists have been mobilised as the military tests decentralised command, communications under disrupted conditions and stronger integration between civilian agencies and the armed forces.
Taiwan is placing greater emphasis on asymmetric capabilities designed to make a cross-strait assault costly. Drones, mobile missile launchers, sea-denial weapons and dispersed command systems have become important elements of planning. Military exercises have also incorporated lessons from conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East, where inexpensive unmanned systems have demonstrated their ability to damage far more costly military assets.
The island is developing its domestic defence industry alongside purchases from the United States. Projects include locally built submarines, missiles and unmanned systems, while American arms orders include F-16V fighters, HIMARS rocket launchers, torpedoes and stand-off weapons. Some deliveries have been delayed because of production and supply-chain constraints, although parts of the HIMARS programme have moved ahead of schedule.
Political approval remains an important hurdle. Taiwan’s opposition-controlled legislature has challenged parts of Lai’s military programme and previously reduced or delayed special defence spending proposed by the administration. Lawmakers in May approved additional defence expenditure worth about US$25 billion, substantially below the amount originally sought by the government.
Those disputes are likely to shape scrutiny of the 2027 proposal once the cabinet sends the wider government budget to parliament. The administration argues that higher expenditure is necessary because military preparedness requires long-term procurement, stockpiling and infrastructure investment rather than emergency spending after a crisis emerges.
China claims Taiwan as part of its territory and has not ruled out the use of force to bring the democratically governed island under its control. Taipei rejects Beijing’s sovereignty claim. Chinese aircraft, naval vessels and coast guard ships operate regularly around Taiwan, while Beijing has repeatedly staged major exercises intended to demonstrate its ability to surround or blockade the island.
Beijing has also continued expanding its own military budget. China announced a 7 per cent increase in defence expenditure for 2026, taking officially declared spending to about US$283 billion, leaving a wide financial and numerical gap between the People’s Liberation Army and Taiwan’s forces.
Yemen’s Houthi movement said it attacked Saudi Aramco’s Jazan refinery with a drone on Sunday, escalating a confrontation that has again placed the kingdom’s energy infrastructure and Red Sea shipping routes under pressure. Saudi authorities confirmed that a fire broke out at the Aramco facility in Jazan, in the kingdom’s southwest, and said emergency teams extinguished it. No injuries were reported. Saudi officials did not immediately confirm […]
Iranian lawmakers are scrutinising the final wording of a proposed maritime agreement with Oman over the Strait of Hormuz as US President Donald Trump says negotiations are advancing towards a deal that could restore commercial shipping through the strategic waterway. Trump said the discussions were “moving along” when questioned by reporters at the White House late Thursday, offering no further details. Tehran has separately indicated that an […]
Arabian Post Staff -Dubai UAE President His Highness Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan and Russian President Vladimir Putin have discussed strengthening bilateral cooperation while calling for intensified diplomatic efforts to ease tensions across the Middle East. The two leaders held a telephone conversation on Friday, reviewing cooperation under the UAE-Russia strategic partnership and reaffirming their commitment to expanding ties in areas of mutual interest. Their discussions […]
Arabian Post Staff -Dubai Abu Dhabi National Oil Company has warned that sustained attacks on its vessels, employees and assets are significantly disrupting operations as insecurity in the Strait of Hormuz deepens pressure on Gulf energy supplies and commercial shipping. ADNOC said on Friday that 15 of its vessels had been targeted by missiles and drones while passing through the strategic waterway since the regional conflict erupted. […]
