The UAE processed more than 14 million TEUs of container traffic through Jebel Ali alone in 2025, making it the largest port in the Middle East and one of the busiest in the world. The digital systems that move that freight terminal operating systems, customs integration platforms, freight forwarding networks and logistics ERP platforms are deeply interconnected and, in many cases, significantly under secured relative to their criticality.

Ransomware groups have noticed. The first half of 2026 has seen a pronounced increase in attacks targeting the UAE logistics and ports sector, with confirmed incidents up 63 percent compared to the equivalent period in 2024. The pattern mirrors what happened to the European logistics sector between 2020 and 2022, when a wave of ransomware attacks on port operators and freight forwarders caused cascading supply chain disruptions that took months to resolve.

What makes the UAE logistics sector particularly vulnerable is not a lack of investment in technology. It is the opposite. The rapid digitalisation of port operations, customs processing and cross-border freight management has created a vastly expanded attack surface at a pace that security architecture has not kept up with. Systems that were isolated five years ago are now integrated. That integration creates efficiency and it creates risk simultaneously.

Ransomware Incidents by Sector: UAE 2024 vs 2026

The chart below compares confirmed ransomware incident counts across key UAE sectors between 2024 and the first half of 2026. The logistics and ports sector shows the largest absolute increase of any sector tracked. Government services remain the highest volume target but the logistics trajectory is the most concerning given the sector’s economic centrality.

Chart 1: Ransomware incidents by sector UAE, 2024 versus H1 2026 (Source: UAE Cybersecurity Council; sector intelligence)

How Attackers Are Getting Into Logistics Networks

The most common initial access method in the UAE logistics incidents investigated in 2025 and 2026 is credential compromise through third-party freight forwarder portals. Large terminal operators maintain dozens of integration points with smaller freight forwarders, customs agents and shipping lines. These third parties frequently have weaker security controls than the primary operator and their credentials provide authenticated access to core logistics platforms.

The second most common entry point is supply chain software compromise. Several freight management platforms widely used in the UAE market have been targeted through their software update mechanisms, allowing attackers to deliver malicious code to all customers running the affected version simultaneously. This is the same technique used against SolarWinds in 2020 applied to the logistics software ecosystem.

The operational impact of ransomware in a port environment is qualitatively different from its impact in other sectors. When a hospital is hit, clinical staff can revert to paper processes for a period while systems are restored. When a terminal operating system is encrypted, containers stop moving. That creates an immediate and highly visible economic impact that makes port operators far more likely to pay a ransom quickly rather than endure an extended recovery process.

The Double Extortion Dimension

Every significant ransomware attack on UAE logistics infrastructure in 2026 has involved data theft before encryption. Attackers exfiltrate manifests, customs declarations, shipper identity records and financial transaction data before deploying the ransomware payload. This creates a second extortion lever: even organisations that restore from backups and refuse to pay to decrypt their systems face a separate demand not to publish the exfiltrated data. The regulatory dimension of this tactic in the UAE is significant. The UAE’s Personal Data Protection Law and sectoral regulations governing customs data create legal obligations around data breach disclosure. An operator whose cargo manifest data has been exfiltrated and threatened with publication faces not only the extortion demand but also a potential regulatory enforcement action if they do not handle the breach disclosure correctly.

What Logistics Operators Should Prioritise

Priority Action	Why It Matters for Logistics	Implementation Timeframe
Audit all third-party portal access	Freight forwarder credentials are the most common initial access vector in UAE logistics incidents	Immediate — within 30 days
Segment terminal operating systems from corporate IT	Prevents ransomware from moving laterally from email compromise to operational systems	Short term — 60 to 90 days
Test incident response plan against a port-specific scenario	Generic IR plans do not account for the operational impact of a terminal system outage	Within 90 days
Implement immutable offline backups for terminal OS	Ransomware operators specifically target backup systems connected to the same network	Short to medium term
Establish aeCERT reporting workflow	NESA compliance requires incident notification to aeCERT; having the workflow ready before an incident saves critical hours	Immediate

Table 1: Priority security actions for UAE logistics and port operators facing elevated ransomware risk in 2026