In Saudi Arabia, the full spectrum of issues surrounding
cybercrime tangles with traditional attitudes about moral values to create
quite a complex navigational field for social media users.
A December 2016 opinion piece by a private party, Saeed Al Qahtani of the corporate law firm Al Tamimi and Company, discussed the Saudi Anti-Cyber Crime
Law, which protects the rights of users and the integrity of the internet, along
with safeguards for data, an effort to protect public morality, and
individual privacy.
One of the things the Qahtani wrestled with is the
effort to distinguish between deliberate and willful cybercrime acts and everyday content social media users might transmit without knowing they’re involved in criminal activity.
For example, since pornography is illegal in Saudi Arabia,
many types of routine forwarding of e-mails or digital messages from outside
the kingdom could constitute some form of cybercrime.
“It is clear that social media users should take care when
using social media and should be mindful at all times of their rights and
obligations under the Saudi Anti-Cyber Crime Law,” Qahtani said.
For more on cybercrime and its effect on social media use in the kingdom, the Gulf News Journal spoke with Tulika Saxena at the global research firm Aranca. Saxena has more than a decade of experience in strategy consulting
and market development in the technology sector.
“In my opinion, although social media
provides opportunities to empower individuals in multiple ways, it gradually is
also becoming a breeding ground for cybercrime, with people misusing these free
and easily accessible platforms,” Saxena said. “Social media platforms provide
these individuals an incredibly broad reach to manipulate users and execute
various cyber scams, ranging from social engineering, brand impersonations, and
account takeovers to more sophisticated attacks, such as shutting down network
servers. Additionally, social media could also be used to facilitate terrorism.”
Saxena pointed out that half of
the Saudi population is under the age of 25.
“Saudi Arabia is unsurprisingly a big
market for social media, not only in the Middle East but also globally,” Saxena
said.
Nearly 65 percent of the country’s population already has access to the internet, he said, the country ranks seventh
globally in terms of individual social media accounts, and it has more than 40 percent of the
Middle East and North Africa region’s Twitter users.
“To combat the growing threat, I believe
it is absolutely essential for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to have
well-defined, effective anti-cybercrime laws and establish a robust regulatory
framework,” Saxena said. “A well-defined regulatory framework would help the
country tackle challenges such as terrorism, which have emerged due to the
changing geopolitical landscape in Saudi Arabia’s immediate neighborhood.
Robust Saudi anti-cybercrime laws would deter cyber criminals from threatening
the country’s peace and economic growth.”
