The programme is the first project of its kind under the council’s Cyberani Practical Training Initiative, which was created with the Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research to prepare university students for cybersecurity careers. Fortinet is participating as a technology and cloud computing partner.
The first phase will be delivered with a UAE-based university and will give selected students access to hands-on laboratories, technical instruction and mentoring from Fortinet specialists. Participants will also have the opportunity to work towards the Fortinet NSE 4 FortiOS certification, which covers areas including firewall policies, virtual private networks, authentication, routing, security profiles and threat protection.
The council and Fortinet said the scheme is intended to connect academic learning more closely with the skills demanded by employers and security teams, while giving students exposure to operational cybersecurity environments. The partners plan to use the initial programme as a model for possible collaboration with more universities and educational institutions across the country.
Dr Mohamed Hamad Al Kuwaiti, head of cyber security for the UAE Government, said building a sustainable national cybersecurity ecosystem required investment in people who would protect the country’s digital future. He said Cyberani and the partnership with Fortinet were designed to create practical pathways for Emirati students to gain knowledge, technical capability and work experience.
Alain Penel, Fortinet’s regional vice-president for the Middle East, Turkey and CIS, said the internship translates the partners’ earlier commitment to national cyber resilience into workforce development. He said participants would receive professional mentorship, build skills aligned with industry requirements and improve their readiness for cybersecurity careers.
The programme follows a memorandum of understanding signed earlier this year between the Cyber Security Council and Fortinet. That agreement set out cooperation on national cybersecurity capabilities, skills development and plans to explore a UAE-based centre of excellence focused on threat intelligence, talent development, start-up enablement and policy collaboration.
Fortinet has separately said its UAE strategy includes potential training laboratories, “train the trainers” programmes, university engagement and professional certification pathways for about 10,000 national trainees. The company has also linked its local investment plans to data sovereignty, threat intelligence and protection of digital infrastructure as organisations increase their use of cloud services, artificial intelligence and connected systems.
The internship initiative comes as the UAE seeks to expand the supply of locally trained specialists able to work across areas such as network security, cloud protection, threat monitoring and incident response. Cyberani is structured to provide practical placements across government and industry so that students can apply academic knowledge in working environments before entering the labour market.
The council has placed workforce development alongside wider measures intended to strengthen national cyber resilience. Those efforts include partnerships with technology companies and educational institutions, as well as programmes designed to develop specialised skills as the country’s digital economy grows and cyber threats become more automated and complex.
Fortinet’s global internship model typically combines project work, mentoring and exposure to operational teams. Its early-talent programme says internships are intended to give students and graduates experience of real workplace challenges and help them understand career paths across cybersecurity and related technology functions.
Under the UAE programme, practical training will be combined with formal learning rather than treated as a stand-alone placement. The emphasis on certification and laboratories is intended to give participants demonstrable technical skills alongside exposure to professional practices and security operations.
The planned centre of excellence remains under exploration under the memorandum of understanding. The internship is expected to contribute to the talent pipeline that could support such a centre by preparing students for roles in threat intelligence, security operations and other specialised areas.
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