@HACK

Black Hat Middle East and Africa, formerly @HACK, is a three-day cybersecurity and hacking convention held annually in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, during Riyadh Season. It is one of the largest conventions in its industry.

The event is co-organised by the Saudi Federation For Cybersecurity, Programming and Drones (SAFCSP), and Tahaluf, an Informa company. It is designed in association with the Black Hat Team.

History

The first event took place from 28–30 November 2021 at Riyadh Front Expo Centre, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The inaugural edition attracted over 25,000 attendees, 250 cybersecurity exhibitors, 50 expert ethical hackers, and many Black Hat trainers. The event also featured two contests, Capture The Flag and Bug Bounty.

Following the 2021 event, @HACK was rebranded as Black Hat Middle East and Africa and relaunched under this name in 2022. The first event of Black Hat MEA was held from 15 – 17 November 2022 at Riyadh Front Exhibition & Conference Center (RFECC) in Saudi Arabia. This edition welcomed 30,000+ visitors at the event and hosted over 250 exhibitors and more than 200 speakers.

The second edition of the event took place at the Riyadh Front Exhibition & Conference Center (RFECC) in Saudi Arabia from 14 – 16 November 2023 under the tagline 'Infosec on the Edge.' The event was attended by over 40.000 infosec or cybersecurity professionals and featured more than 300 speakers and exhibitors from over 120 countries. The line-up included CISOs from Huawei, Netflix, Uber, Airbus, FBI and Zoom. The event also featured the youngest-ever speaker, 13-year-old Marco Liberale, with a session on ransomware.

The 2023 edition of Black Hat MEA introduced an Investor Programme with over 80 investors seeking opportunities in cybersecurity startups. These new initiatives complemented Black Hat MEA’s existing tournaments and a cybersecurity-focused Activity Zone, sponsored by NEOM in the 2023 edition, with prize funds of up to SAR 1,000,000.

The third edition of Black Hat Middle East and Africa was held from 26 to 28 November 2024, at the Riyadh Exhibition and Convention Center in Malham, Saudi Arabia. Branded as "Cybersecurity's Global Stage," the event attracted an attendance of over 45,000 professionals from the cybersecurity and information security sectors worldwide. The three-day event featured over 330 speakers and 450 exhibitors, both international and local, with participants representing 167 countries.

The 2024 edition introduced several elements, including the CyberSurge Boot Camp, which provided a learning platform for entrepreneurs aspiring to launch cybersecurity startups in Saudi Arabia, and hosted the Cyberseed Start-up Competition for the third consecutive year, where eight startups competed for a prize of $30,000 by pitching their ideas to a panel of judges.

In this edition, the event's Capture the Flag Tournament, introduced in Black Hat MEA 2022, earned a Guinness World Record for being the World's Largest Capture the Flag Tournament (Hackathon).

Black Hat MEA 2025, the event's fourth edition, is scheduled to take place from 24 to 26 November in Riyadh.

Speakers and sponsors

Across its various editions, the conference has hosted many executives, government officials, and security experts, including Jayson E. Street, Jenny Radcliffe, Bruce Schneier, Kurt Sanger, Alissa Abdullah, Magda Lilia Chelly, Caleb Sima, Chris Roberts, Kim Albarella, Cynthia Kaiser, Camille Vasquez, Dr. Pascal Andrei, Gary Sorrentino, Jeff Scheaffer, Chris Meenan, Kiran P P who is known for being a two-time NASA hacker and Google Hacker, CISOs of major tech companies and local government entities such as Netflix, Uber, Snap Inc, Thales Group, Ministry of Justice (KSA), Coca-Cola, The Wendy's Company, Prada, and Google DeepMind.

Black Hat's sponsors and partners include venture capitalists, Fortune 500 companies, government agencies, education institutes and start-ups. These included IBM, Cisco, Honeywell, Fortinet, Kaspersky, Cisco, IBM, Spire and Infoblox, Haboob, Trend Micro, FlagYard, Group IB and Cipher.

See also

*Web Summit
*Consumer Electronics Show
*Slush

References

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Computer security conferences
Hacker conventions
Hacking (computer security)