Hong Kong firms urged to add artificial intelligence tools to cybersecurity defenses

The Enterprise Cybersecurity Readiness Index rose to 52.8 this year, up 5.8 points from last year, according to results jointly released by the Office of the Privacy Commissioner (PCPD) and the Hong Kong Productivity Council (HKPC) in Thursday.

While the growth was the biggest year-on-year jump since 2018, the figure remained at a “baseline” level, according to Alex Chan Chung-man, general manager of digital transformation at HKPC.

The businesses had some consistent cybersecurity measures in place, he said, but “there was a lack of centralized management or granular controls.”

“This improvement is primarily due to more businesses conducting cybersecurity risk assessments and engaging third-party assessors to assess their IT systems this year,” he said.

Of the four components of the index, “increasing human awareness” remains the lowest since 2018.