TechTouch Asia

Sophos, a global cybersecurity provider, has revealed that businesses are increasingly prioritising budget for cybersecurity. In 2022, 11% of technology budgets are dedicated to cybersecurity, an increase from 8.6% the previous year, Sophos research* has found. Asia Pacific and Japan (APJ) organisations have identified threat hunting as a key consideration for strengthening cybersecurity defences. Most organisations (90%) undertook threat hunting to bolster their cybersecurity capabilities in 2021; of those that did, 85% stated the approach is critical or important to their company’s overall cybersecurity capabilities. “It’s great to see organisations taking cybersecurity more seriously, with budgets and maturity levels on the rise and organisations looking to build threat hunting into their cyberdefence strategies,” said Aaron Bugal, Global Solutions Engineer at Sophos. “Given that threat hunting has become a priority for the majority of organisations, it’s interesting to see that...

Consumers in the Asia Pacific region (APAC) remain among the most enthusiastic adopters of digital payments in the world, with 88% having used technologies like digital wallets, QR codes, buy now pay later (BNPL), cryptocurrencies, biometrics and others in the last year, according to Mastercard’s second annual New Payments Index (NPI)*, a global consumer survey spanning 40 markets across five regions, including seven in APAC. What’s more, 69% of APAC consumers increased their usage of at least one digital payment method during the same period, demonstrating momentum. In comparison, only 52% of consumers in North America and 48% in Europe increased their usage in the same way. While the COVID-19 pandemic was the catalyst for the unprecedented, rapid uptake of digital payments, the latest research indicates that the change has been lasting, with 40% of survey respondents in APAC cutting back on their use of cash in the last year. Despite this swing to digital forms of payment, respond...

Source: Fortinet. Singapore 1H22 findings from the FortiGuard Labs Global Threat Landscape Report . Fortinet, a global player in broad, integrated, and automated cybersecurity solutions, has announced that the ransomware threat continues to adapt, with more variants enabled by ransomware-as-a-service (RaaS). According to the company's semiannual FortiGuard Labs Global Threat Landscape Report * for 1H22: - Work-from-anywhere (WFA) endpoints remain targets for cyber adversaries to gain access to corporate networks.  - Operational technology (OT) and information technology (IT) environments are both attractive targets as cyber adversaries search for opportunities in the growing attack surface and IT/OT convergence.  - Destructive threat trends continue to evolve, as evidenced by the spread of wiper malware as part of adversary toolkits.  - Cyber adversaries are embracing more reconnaissance and defense evasion techniques to increase precision and destructive weaponisat...

Stringr, the video sourcing, production, and management platform for news and consumer content, has launched a new version of its software-as-a-service (SaaS) solution, the Stringr Remote Video Sourcing and Production platform. The end-to-end platform connects media companies with instant access to custom video footage, remote production software and limitless video distribution options. “With our SaaS Remote Video Sourcing and Production platform, we simplify every part of the video production chain; our customers can not only get custom video footage quickly, now they can also create and share video content faster than ever before,” said Lindsay Stewart, Co-founder and CEO, Stringr.  “ Stringr is the only real-time solution available for sourcing and sharing video. And our clients are already seeing the benefits, by being able to produce more video content without any increase in resources.” “Stringr has always been about empowering media companies to acquire exclusive video foot...

Adyen, the global financial technology platform, has launched its first in-house designed terminals. “Adyen’s commitment is to help businesses realize their ambitions faster, and creating our own terminals is the latest way we’re delivering on this promise,” said Kamran Zaki, COO at Adyen. “We always innovate based on customer feedback to deliver superior experiences with speed and flexibility. With our in-person payments offering, businesses have a full suite of terminals to choose from, enabling them to pick the best one to meet their specific needs.” The devices realise customer wishes to be mobile, discrete, reliable, affordable, with long-lasting battery, and accepting payments spanning a tap, dip, or swipe. They run on Adyen’s single platform, which enables end-to-end control, tailored payment flows, and high speed of innovation at the point-of-sale. Said Derk Busser, VP of Product, In-Person Payments: “Our goal is to continuously reduce friction within the consumer journey...