Pakistan has achieved the top score in the International Telecommunication Union’s (ITU) Global Cybersecurity Index 2024 report. The report ranks hundreds of countries across different continents according to their cybersecurity status and Pakistan was ranked among the top-tier performers.
The report divides these countries into tiers, indicating their cybersecurity performance scores. Those with the highest scores reach the highest tier (Tier 1) while those with the lowest fall under Tier 5. The score takes into account several factors such as a country’s legal measures, technical measures, organization measures, capacity development, and cooperation measures. Here are all the tiers:
Pakistan was ranked in the highest tier (role modeling) with a score as high as 95-100. Other countries on this list were Australia, Germany, the United States, Bahrain, Italy, Oman, and many others. This means that Pakistan is regarded as a role model when it comes to cybersecurity measures.
In the previous edition of the Global Cybersecurity Index report, Pakistan ranked 79.
Pakistan scored 20 (on a scale of 1-20) for legal measures, 18.21 for technical measures, 20 for organization measures, 20 for capacity development, 18.48 for cooperation measures. This puts Pakistan ahead of hundreds of other contenders on the list.
Pakistan’s performance was hailed on Friday by the State Minister for Information Technology and Telecommunication, Shaza Fatima Khawaja. She said:
The Global Cybersecurity Index 2024 shows significant improvements by countries that are implementing essential legal measures, plans, capacity building initiatives, and cooperation frameworks, especially in strengthening incident response capabilities. Pakistan has performed exceptionally well in the latest ranking and has been placed in Tier 1, alongside countries like the United States, Japan, Singapore, Australia, Saudi Arabia, and Malaysia.