Hong Kong authorities have urged companies to adopt artificial intelligence (AI) to bolster data protection amid a slight increase in the city’s cybersecurity readiness index over last year.
The Enterprise Cyber Security 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 for Personal Data (PCPD) and the Hong Kong Productivity Council (HKPC) on Thursday.
While the increase was the largest jump in a year since 2018, the score remained at a “basic” level, according to Alex Chan Chung-man, general manager of digital transformation at the HKPC.
Enterprises had some consistent cybersecurity measures but “no central management or fine-grained control”, he said.
“The improvement is primarily due to more enterprises conducting cybersecurity risk assessments this year and engaging third-party assessors to evaluate their IT systems,” he said.
Of the index’s four components, “human awareness building” has remained the lowest since 2018.