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Cyber defense chief Yossi Karadi warned on Tuesday that Israel needs to bolster its preparedness for what he described as a fast-approaching “cyber war” driven by artificial intelligence agents that will replace the physical battlefield.
“We are heading toward a reality where a war will begin and end in the digital domain,” said Brig. Gen. (res.) Karadi, head of the Israel National Cyber Directorate (INDC), at the 2026 Cybertech Global conference in Tel Aviv. “The first cyber war driven by AI agents won’t begin with a siren; it will begin with the disruption of services, of decision-making, and of daily life.”
“A war where no bullet is fired, no tank moves, no aircraft takes off, and yet a country can be defeated,” he cautioned.
Karadi called on decision-makers to “ensure national readiness for this war across government, industry, and society.”
“Since October 7, 2023, we have been at war, and the cyber front is only intensifying,” said Karadi, referring to the Hamas-led massacre that began the war in Gaza. “Speed and agility are critical to develop defensive solutions before our adversaries develop attack vectors.”
Karadi disclosed that in 2025 alone, his INDC handled more than 26,000 cyberattacks, a 55% increase over 2024. Israel ranks as the third most attacked country in the world, according to Microsoft’s latest data, with 3.5% of all global cyberattacks directed at Israel over the past year.
“Gladly, most of the attempts were detected and prevented,” Karadi remarked. “These numbers tell us one thing very clearly: Cyber is no longer supporting the battlefield, cyber is the battlefield.”
“This battlefield will be so fast, many events will begin and end without human visibility,” he predicted.
Speaking to The Times of Israel on the sidelines of the conference, Sergey Shykevich, head of threat intelligence at Check Point Software Technologies, said that AI and deepfakes (manipulated images and video) are reshaping the cyber threat landscape, blurring the line between what is real and what is fake, which opens up another arena for attackers to extract sensitive information and data from government entities, healthcare providers, and enterprises.
“In cyber warfare, the vast majority, probably 95% of the activity is Iran-linked,” said Shykevich. “The goal is to hack and leak information from operations and companies to show Israelis that our government and our authorities are not able to protect its citizens.”
He added, “During the 12-day war with Iran in June, we also saw an increase of 1,500% in the targeting or hacking of specific vulnerabilities in cameras in Israel by Iranian attackers, and the main goal was to understand whether the rockets they fired were successful or not.”
Karadi said that over the past year in Israel, the three most targeted areas by bad actors were the financial sector, government institutions, and digital service providers.
In response, and to address the new reality of emerging threats, Israel has launched a national multi-year cyber defense plan built on three main strategic pillars: cloud security, cyber AI, and quantum technologies, according to Karadi.
“The transition to the cloud is happening across government, military, industry, and the economy,” said Karadi. “The cyber arena is shifting, and the cloud is becoming a big attack surface, and this is where the cybersecurity industry plays a critical role.”
“Israel is already a leading cybersecurity powerhouse, and now our task is to extend that leadership into cyber AI, building AI-based detection, identification, and mitigation capabilities,” he said.
The true impact of the quantum technology front, Karadi said, will be far more profound.
“Quantum will reshape the entire cyber landscape, opening a new attack surface we do not yet fully understand,” Karadi said. “Our role is to set the national strategy that will enable capabilities, skills, infrastructures, and strengthen true public-private partnership.”
“We are promoting national technological initiatives to connect Israeli technology to our national projects,” he said.
Shykevich emphasized that in 2026, the main challenge is to protect the AI ecosystem as autonomous technologies are increasingly embedded in the day-to-day operations of businesses, governments, and organizations.
“AI is a new technology, and everyone is excited, including the attackers, so this year we will face more attacks on the AI ecosystem and the AI surface,” said Shykevich. “The danger is that if we don’t keep [up] with the speed, and with figuring out what we need to protect in this cat and mouse game, the cat will win.”
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