Editor’s note: Mohamed Isa Hammad, CISA, CRISC, CISM, CDPSE, AAISM was recognized this year with the ISACA Innovation Solutions Award for spearheading initiatives that reduced fraud cases and breaches faced by citizens in Bahrain, resulting in saving significant costs associated with these and other social engineering attacks. Find out more about Mohamed in this Q&A with the ISACA Now blog below, and learn more about ISACA’s Global Achievement Awards here.
ISACA Now: What does winning the Innovative Solutions Award mean to you personally and professionally?
Receiving ISACA’s Global Achievement Award is a defining moment in my professional journey. It represents the culmination of years of dedication, collaboration and a shared vision to build impactful solutions on a national scale with multiple stakeholders.
This recognition is not only a personal milestone but also a reflection of the collective support I’ve received—particularly from Bahrain Islamic Bank (BisB). Their unwavering commitment to innovation and empowerment has been instrumental in enabling the environment where such achievements can flourish. I’m truly grateful to be part of an organization that values progress and encourages its people to lead meaningful change.
ISACA Now: You’ve been recognized for leading initiatives that reduced fraud cases and breaches faced by citizens in Bahrain. Can you tell us about that experience? What was the most rewarding aspect?
The award covers a list of initiatives, programs and enhancements that were reached through active collaborations with multiple stakeholders in the country. Starting from the financial sector regulator, Central Bank of Bahrain (CBB), to the Information and eGovernment Authority (IGA), the National Cyber Security Center (NCSC), Telecommunication Regulatory Authority (TRA), Ministry of Interior and technology partners and peers.
The enhancements included agreeing on certain controls, preventive and corrective measures that can minimize, detect and mitigate rampant fraud waves through multiple means. This ongoing partnership resulted in the enhancement of multiple regulatory requirements, practices and policies across the Kingdom of Bahrain.
The results were a rapid decrease and eradication of certain methodology which impacted almost everyone in the country. And the most rewarding aspect of this is not hearing about stories of regular people of all walks of lives falling victims to such schemes and the regained trust of people around the overall security and safety of their accounts.
ISACA Now: You have a people-centric approach to security. What does that mean to you? Why is it important?
At Bahrain Islamic Bank (BisB), we adopted a brand promise to craft new ways of simplifying money matters. Human-centricity and simplification is an approach we deeply believe in when designing services and products that have embedded security, privacy and resilience by design. We continue to utilize advanced AI solutions, coupled with data insights to create a seamless user experience that is designed to protect customers from threats, even threats that they can expose themselves to.
At the same time, we emphasize the importance of building “Human in the Loop” practices across all digital offerings and products, to live up to the promise of providing services that align with cultural traditions and ethical guidelines.
Our human-centric approach is evident in our information security team that we believe includes the entire workforce of the bank, through active collaboration and empowerment of our expanded team.
The same principles apply when we are working with various partners across the nation, prioritizing goals and interests of all stakeholders to achieve results at a national level.
ISACA Now: What does being part of the ISACA community mean to you?
I’ve been a member of ISACA for 19 years and always recognized the value an organization like ISACA can bring through publications, professional certifications (that I maintained four of across these years, with AAISM being the latest addition), and through collaboration with colleagues who are members of ISACA Bahrain Chapter, who were present in many of the initiatives that led to this achievement.
ISACA Now: Is there anything else you would like to add?
I believe that expansions of an information security professional role across various domains is key to the success of individuals, firms and nations alike. This was clear in linking common objectives of various stakeholders together, utilizing platforms for new, innovative ways and sharing experiences across various industries and groups.
During my professional career, I always stressed that information security professionals cannot achieve results beyond their specific roles by mastering one domain or in some cases a sub-domain of the entire profession. A multi-disciplinary approach is the true enabler for challenging goals and visions.
