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The report combines regional threat intelligence from Mastercard’s Cyber Insights platform with enterprise cyber-risk assessments through RiskRecon, alongside advanced data analytics from Recorded Future, the cybersecurity intelligence firm acquired by Mastercard in December 2024.
According to the report, cyber risks in the region are increasingly translating into economic and operational costs for businesses and governments, as cyberattacks evolve in scale, sophistication, and financial impact. It stressed that cybersecurity has become a board-level priority, reflecting its direct link to business continuity and financial stability in an increasingly digital economy.
Citing IBM’s Cost of a Data Breach Report 2025, the report noted that the average cost of a data breach in the Middle East reached $7.29 million per incident, around 64 percent higher than the global average, underscoring the rising financial burden of cyber incidents on regional economies.
The findings show that cybercrime activity in the region rose in early 2026, coinciding with heightened geopolitical tensions, with financially motivated and disruptive attacks accounting for 71 percent of all recorded incidents across EEMEA. The report said this trend highlights the growing convergence between geopolitical risk and cyber exposure.
Mastercard said cyber resilience has become a key pillar of economic and operational stability, with Celine Badirli, Executive Vice President for Services in EEMEA, noting that companies must adopt proactive and integrated cybersecurity strategies to safeguard digital infrastructure and maintain trust in the digital economy.
The report identified business systems, customer data, and physical infrastructure as the main targets of cyberattacks, accounting for 66 percent of all observed targets, with attackers primarily aiming to disrupt operations, commit fraud, or cause physical damage.
Sectorally, government, technology, and financial services emerged as the most targeted industries, representing 44 percent of total attacks, reflecting their high-value data assets and central role in digital and economic ecosystems.
It also found that common attack methods, including malware, ransomware and phishing campaigns, remain dominant, while gaps persist in application security and website encryption across several markets.
Beyond large corporations, Mastercard stressed that cybersecurity risks extend to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), which are increasingly integrated into the digital economy. The company said strengthening cyber protection is essential for inclusive growth and sustainable digital expansion.
Globally, Mastercard said it has surpassed its goal of enabling 50 million SMEs to access the digital economy, and is now targeting 500 million individuals and small businesses by 2030, supported by investments in cybersecurity and digital trust.
The company added that it has invested $12.6 billion in cybersecurity innovation since 2019, and processed 175 billion transactions in 2025, using artificial intelligence and data analytics to enhance fraud detection and system security.
Through solutions such as RiskRecon, Cyber Quant, and Cyber Insights, alongside intelligence from Recorded Future, Mastercard said it aims to provide real-time threat visibility to governments and companies, helping them detect risks earlier and strengthen operational resilience in an increasingly complex cyber landscape.
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