UPDATES
threat
UPDATES
MIDDLE EAST
The Middle East cyber threat landscape is seeing a notable shift, with ransomware activity increasing as hacktivist attacks decline.
Hacktivism dominated much of 2025, with activity surging during periods of geopolitical escalation, particularly in June and October 2025 and March 2026. However, volumes fell sharply from April 2026.
Ransomware followed the opposite trajectory, rising steadily before reaching a significant peak in June 2026. CloudSEK’ s analysis indicates that politically motivated hacktivists and financially motivated ransomware groups largely operate according to different cycles.
Nova emerged as the most prolific ransomware operator in the regional dataset. The Gentlemen, Qilin, LockBit5 and DragonForce were also observed in campaigns affecting Middle Eastern organisations.
The Gentlemen represents a notable emerging threat. According to the report, the ransomware group exploited the Fortinet authentication-bypass vulnerability CVE-2024-55591, alongside VPN credential brute-forcing to gain access to targeted environments. The group also used Rclone to facilitate data theft.
GLOBAL
New research from Infoblox Threat Intel has revealed that similar-looking online casino websites can conceal very different cyber risks, ranging from illegal gambling and money laundering to consumer fraud and malware infrastructure.
Researchers identified more than 1.7 million Chinese-language casino domains linked to illegal gambling and money laundering. Infoblox tracks 16 clusters, with FUNNULL and Vigorish Viper accounting for around 81 % of the identified domains.
A second category, described as‘ scambling’, uses gambling websites to defraud users through rigged games, blocked withdrawals, additional fees and other tactics. These operations primarily target English-speaking users, although campaigns have also appeared across Europe, South America and Asia.
Researchers also identified casino sites containing PeckBirdy command-and-control domains. The framework has been used by China-aligned APT groups since 2023.
WWW. INTELLIGENTCISO. COM / MIDDLE-EAST 35