Intelligent CIO Middle East Issue 26 | Page 16

NEWS ITA organises the first Interregional Standardisation Forum for PKI and eTrust Oman development to contribute to record retail spend A project to build a major shopping mall in Muscat will contribute to the rapid acceleration of the retail sector in the Middle East. Trade from the Mall of Oman, which will feature 350 outlets in 137,000 square metres of retail space, will contribute to the growth of the GCC’s retail sector expected to hit a high of USD 313 billion by 2021. Along with other developments such as the City Centre Al Jazira in Abu Dhabi and the Mall of Saudi in Riyadh, the Mall of Oman will utilise technology to transform the in- store experience. A forum has been held in Oman on bridging the standardisation gap in the hyperconnected world. Participating in the event held at the Conference Hall of the Public Authority for Civil Aviation, were The Information Technology Authority, represented by the National Digital Certification Centre and the Arab ICT Organisation, and the International Telecommunications Union. Also present were a number of government officials, international experts, representatives of Arab and African Digital Certification Centres and ICT professionals. On the importance of public key infrastructure (PKI) Omar Bin Salim Alshanfari, Deputy CEO for Operations 16 INTELLIGENTCIO at ITA, said: “The big challenge facing governments and businesses alike is how to keep up with the tremendous progress in the digital world and keep their services and networks away from the cyber threats increasingly rising worldwide. “In this respect, there’s the need to shift to strong eTrust services to verify the user’s identity through the internet such as the PKI which is becoming a must have technology since it provides a wide range of applications dealing with the identity authentication, confidentiality, access control and security.” “Audiovisual innovations are the biggest game changers for transforming the atmospheric and spatial qualities for GCC Smart Cities and smart interiors,” said Dr Dolli Daou, Director, Association of Professional Interior Designers while at InfoComm Middle East and Africa (MEA), the region’s largest professional audiovisual event. As malls transform into shopping destinations, live events are increasingly common for them to differentiate themselves from the e-commerce experience. “GCC malls are no longer only about shopping – with mall operators and retailers transforming malls into entertainment destinations,” said Hans J van den Berg, CEO, AudiCom Middle East. InfoComm MEA was held under the theme of ‘See the Future of Networked Communications’ and hosted more than 100 exhibitors from 20 countries. “In this context, ITA developed the regulatory framework and the integrated infrastructure for PKI in accordance with the eTransactions law issued in 2008 by the establishment of the National Digital Certification Centre.” www.intelligentcio.com