Southeast Asia’s digital economy is projected to reach $1 trillion by 2030, positioning the region as a critical global hub for digital innovation and economic growth. This unprecedented transformation has made the region a prime target for sophisticated cyberthreats. In 2024, Southeast Asia experienced more than 135,274 ransomware attacks, according to recent intelligence. With 67% of all regional cyber incidents occurring in a single year, this marks the highest concentration of cybersecurity challenges ever recorded in ASEAN markets.
The South East Asia Summit 2025 brings together the region’s most influential cybersecurity executives, thought leaders and innovators to address the complex challenges shaping Southeast Asia’s digital landscape. This premier virtual summit, centered around the theme “From Strategic Vision to Operational Excellence: Leading Cybersecurity in Southeast Asia’s Digital Future,” focuses on bridging the gap between cybersecurity strategy and practical implementation across ASEAN’s diverse regulatory and business environments.
The summit will provide actionable insights into emerging threats, including AI-powered attacks, quantum computing risks, supply chain vulnerabilities and the evolving geopolitical cyber warfare landscape affecting Southeast Asian enterprises. Participants will gain strategic frameworks for building cyber-resilient organizations while using cybersecurity investments to drive innovation, market expansion and stakeholder trust.
Our Summit Advisory Committee comprises industry visionaries who guide the conference’s content, ensuring that it remains relevant, cutting-edge, and aligned with the most pressing cybersecurity challenges and opportunities.
Industry leaders from various sectors in the technology domain share their experience on how the role of chief technology officers (CTOs) has become indispensable across organizations. They discuss unique strategies and techniques applied in businesses, making technology an intrinsic part of their organizational DNA. Additionally, these thought leaders delve into how they have redefined leadership to enhance the organization’s resilience and share their insights on artificial intelligence, sustainability, and the future of internet.
Regional harmonization under the ASEAN Cybersecurity Cooperation Strategy 2021–2025 is accelerating alongside sophisticated national data protection and cybersecurity laws that require comprehensive enterprise readiness.
This evolution presents both the greatest compliance challenge and a significant competitive opportunity in the region’s history. Organizations must navigate enhanced obligations – from Singapore’s strengthened PDPA and Malaysia’s new Cyber Security Act to Thailand’s extraterritorial enforcement and Vietnam’s forthcoming data protection law – while transforming compliance into a strategic enabler of business growth and resilience.
This session will cover:
Abid Adam, Group Chief Risk & Compliance Officer, Axiata
But this rapid AI proliferation occurs against a backdrop of sophisticated AI-driven cyberthreats, with APAC experiencing an increase in cyber incident frequency and fraud-related claims driven by deepfake attacks and AI-powered social engineering.
Attendees will gain a practical framework for translating high-level principles – transparency, robustness and accountability – into board-level risk metrics, security controls and assurance programs that keep innovation on track while meeting the expectations of regulators, customers and investors.
This session will cover:
Esti Peshin, VP, General Manager, Cyber Division, IAI – Israel Aerospace Industries
With companies implementing agentic AI and planning deployment within the next year, the question is no longer whether agentic AI will transform cybersecurity, but how quickly organizations can harness its potential while managing unprecedented risks.
Leading industry practitioners, technology innovators and risk management experts will examine the real-world implementation of agentic AI in cybersecurity across ASEAN markets, where organizations report significant decision-making improvements and achieve substantial productivity gains through autonomous AI systems.
This session will cover:
Jagathesh Ragavasagam, Risk and Cybersecurity Officer, Abbott
Sourabh Chitrachar, Regional Vice President/Head- Asia Technology Strategy & Operations, Liberty Mutual Insurance
Justin Ong, APAC CISO and Chief Privacy Officer, Panasonic Asia Pacific Pte.Ltd
As the region accelerates digital transformation and Industry 4.0 adoption, OT environments face a rapidly expanding and sophisticated threat landscape, requiring cybersecurity leadership that transcends traditional IT approaches.
This fireside chat will explore how leading cybersecurity executives are elevating OT security from a technical challenge into a strategic imperative – aligning governance frameworks, regulatory compliance and risk management to build resilient, mission-critical defenses against nation-state actors, ransomware campaigns and supply chain compromises.
This session will cover:
Carolyn Bigg, Partner and Global Co-Chair of the Data, Privacy and Cyber Group, DLA Piper, Singapore
Sunari Dandeniya, Chief Information Security Officer, Commercial Bank of Ceylon PL
In the SEA region, 97% of regional companies are small and medium-sized enterprises that often lack robust security infrastructure, even as the region serves as a critical node in global supply chains.
This panel will bring together leading practitioners who have navigated the complex realities of securing supply chains across ASEAN’s diverse regulatory and operational landscape, where traditional perimeter-based security models have proven inadequate against sophisticated threat actors exploiting trusted vendor relationships.
This session will cover:
Jenny Tan, President, ISACA-Singapore Chapter
John Lee, Managing Director-Asia Pacific, GRF
Steven Sim Kok Leong, Chair, Executive Committee, OT-ISAC
This session will explore real-world experiences from Southeast Asian organizations that have successfully operationalized AI in multi-cloud environments, examining the security architectures, governance frameworks and operational practices that separate successful AI deployments from costly security failures.
This session will cover:
Reuben Athaide, Head, Cyber Security Advisory and DevSecOps, Standard Chartered Bank
AI-powered payment systems create unprecedented financial inclusion opportunities while introducing new attack vectors, including deepfakes, synthetic identity fraud and autonomous bots, thereby challenging conventional security paradigms.
This panel will feature leading practitioners implementing AI-enhanced digital identity systems across Southeast Asia’s diverse regulatory landscape. Discussions will focus on transitioning from traditional password-based authentication toward sophisticated, multi-modal verification systems leveraging facial recognition, voice patterns, behavioral biometrics and continuous adaptive trust mechanisms to secure the region’s evolving digital payment infrastructure.
This session will cover:
Raina Verma, Advisory Council Member, Association of Certified Fraud Examiners (ACFE)
Sujit Christy, Secretary/Immediate past president, ISC2- Colombo Chapter, Sri Lanka, President, Circulo de CISO
As ASEAN enterprises embrace remote work, cloud-first strategies and IoT proliferation, traditional endpoint models prove inadequate against advanced persistent threats and AI-powered attacks targeting the region.
This session will explore practical realities of implementing AI-enhanced zero trust in Southeast Asia’s complex digital landscape, addressing implementation challenges, regulatory compliance and cultural transformation required to move from implicit trust to continuous verification paradigms while enabling business innovation.
This session will cover:
Dr. Jassim Haji, Executive Advisor for AI & Data Science, NAIRDC
Mahesh Chandran, Director AI, Fujitsu Research
Both the terms are often used interchangeably but have distinct connotations. While both emphasize the utilization of data for decision-making, data-first involves inga comprehensive data-centric approach across the organization, placing data at the core of the operations – as opposed to specific projects – to inform decision-making.
The session will delve into what it takes for organizations to scale from a data-driven to data-first enterprise.
The session will cover:
Dr. Jassim Haji, Executive Advisor for AI & Data Science, NAIRDC
Mahesh Chandran, Director AI, Fujitsu Research
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