Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC), the leading international financial centre connecting businesses and financial institutions with emerging markets across the Middle East, South Asia and Africa (MEASA) region, has been awarded the ISO/IEC 27001 accreditation in Information Security Management Systems. Presented on Tuesday 29th November to Arif Amiri, Chief Executive Officer of DIFC Authority by UK Consular General, Mr Paul Fox on behalf of the British Standards Institute, the accreditation is testament to the Centre’s efforts in ensuring a secure environment for clients to operate in the information age.
ISO/IEC 27001 accreditation recognises the highest quality of financial data, intellectual property or customer sensitive information protection and use as well as putting in place steps to help identify and reduce information assurance risks. The robust framework which DIFC has developed requires surveillance audits for the next two years to maintain the high standard and gives clients the highest level of gold standard confidence that their information can be shared with DIFC for regulatory purposes. The eight months of rigorous auditing also certifies DIFC Data Centre Co-Location services, adding value to clients using these services and meeting their computing facility audit requirements.
DIFC already has a strong reputation for an internationally recognised and respected regulatory framework of processes, licensing requirements and procedures for companies keen to set up their business in the region and expand operations into the world’s fastest growing markets. The accreditation builds on this by recognising that information security is a key regulatory competitive advantage and DIFC is committed to providing the best environment in which to do business for its clients, backed up by its independent Data Protection Commissioner.
The accreditation comes at a time of large scale growth in DIFC, which has relied on maximum information sharing, big data-enabled businesses and FinTech making managing information safely more important than ever for business trust, reputation and expansion for the Centre’s 1,500 firms and 21,000 professionals.
Arif Amiri, CEO of DIFC Authority commented on the prestigious accreditation: “Receiving this award sets DIFC apart as the place to do business in a fast-changing, inter-connected and data driven region. The new announcement shows that we are internationally recognised as being committed to protecting and securing the information of our clients and are anticipating the next frontier of information assurance as stability is the key to opening up the potential of our surrounding markets. Information security and the continuous enhancement of our physical and regulatory infrastructure are key enablers for DIFC’s 2024 Strategy, which aims to triple the size of the Centre over the course of ten years.”
The ISO accreditation was granted by The British Standards Institution (BSI), a world-class business standards organisation that has allowed businesses around the world to drive performance, manage risk and become sustainable though the adoption of international management system standards since it was established in 1901.
The DIFC Data Centre Co-Location services, adding value to clients using these services and meeting their computing facility audit requirements were marked out in the accreditation. In April, this year, the DIFC Co-Location Data Centre became the first in the UAE to obtain the internationally recognised Management and Operations (M&O) Stamp of Approval from Uptime Institute, the unbiased standards and certification organisation, acknowledging the quality and best practice of the Centre and its IT infrastructure.
