Logitech (SIX: LOGN) (NASDAQ: LOGI) has announced that all video collaboration devices that run on the CollabOS operating system will now be manufactured with next-life plastics. This move will help enterprise customers support their sustainability objectives.

Efforts to reduce negative environmental impact have rapidly become a business imperative. In a recent survey by analyst firm Frost & Sullivan, 65% of IT professionals say that becoming a leader in environmental, social, governance and sustainability practices is a critical or very important business objective in the coming year.

Logitech’s video conferencing portfolio will now be designed for sustainability, using materials that lower the carbon impact of each product. Existing products such as the Rally Bar, Rally Bar Mini, Tap IP, Tap Scheduler, and Scribe– are being refreshed with materials that lower the carbon impact of each product.

“By transitioning our portfolio of conference room devices to a lower product carbon footprint, we are helping other companies better navigate their sustainability challenges,” said Prakash Arunkundrum, Chief Operating Officer at Logitech. “We’re not only designing and manufacturing new products with recycled plastic and other lower-carbon materials but refreshing existing products to provide IT leaders with a new way to evaluate their workplace technology investment in conference room systems – one that includes people and planet. We do this without increasing prices or compromising the highest quality and performance companies expect from Logitech.”

Applying Design for Sustainability (DfS) principles to Logitech’s video collaboration portfolio means that Logitech customers can outfit entire conference rooms– including Microsoft Teams Rooms and Zoom Rooms–with sustainability focussed technology. This development expands on the progress already achieved with personal workstation peripherals such as webcams, headsets, mice, and keyboards.

A key tenet of DfS is the use of circular materials that can be recovered from the waste stream and given a second life, including post-consumer recycled plastics (PCR) that Logitech calls “next-life plastics.”

Logitech has decreased its Scope 3 emissions by 21% in 2022 with the goal of removing more carbon than it creates by 2030. To drive carbon reduction at an even bigger scale and stimulate industry-wide progress, Logitech is offering to openly share its DfS principles, tools and knowledge of how to incorporate more sustainable materials in the manufacturing process with any organizations in the consumer technology industry interested in increasing their sustainability efforts. For a consultation on how to incorporate more sustainable materials into your manufacturing process, contact [email protected].

Transparency and Accountability

As more companies hold themselves accountable for measurably reducing their carbon impact, they increasingly seek out technology vendors who provide transparency via key performance indicators, reporting, and third-party certifications. Logitech is on track to achieve its 2025 target of having a product carbon footprint for every product in its portfolio, making it easier for company technology buyers to make informed decisions about–and report on– the scope of their impact when outfitting their global workforces for meeting rooms, personal workstations, and flex desking. Logitech annually reports on its progress toward its Climate Action goals in the 2023 Impact Report.

About Logitech

Logitech helps all people pursue their passions and is committed to doing so in a way that is good for people and the planet. We design hardware and software solutions that help businesses thrive and bring people together when working, creating, gaming and streaming. Brands of Logitech include Logitech, Logitech G, Streamlabs and Ultimate Ears. Founded in 1981, and headquartered in Lausanne, Switzerland, Logitech International is a Swiss public company listed on the SIX Swiss Exchange (LOGN) and the Nasdaq Global Select Market (LOGI). Find Logitech at www.logitech.com, the company blog, LinkedIn Business or @LogitechBiz.

Logitech and other Logitech marks are trademarks or registered trademarks of Logitech Europe S.A and/or its affiliates in the U.S. and other countries. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. For more information about Logitech and its products, visit the company’s website at www.logitech.com.

*Based on a global electricity consumption emissions factor from Logitech’s Carbon Clarity program. Internal estimates of pre-optimization use phase carbon impact of 19.8t CO2e for Rally Bar and 21t CO2e for Rally Bar Mini for each 100 products used over a period of 2 years. Logitech’s internal user model for room VC equipment (based on recorded data from VC room usage)

**Based on energy saving mode switched on an EnergyStar certified, 50–69-inch, low energy television baseline, a global electricity consumption emissions factor from Logitech’s Carbon Clarity program. Internal estimates of pre-optimization use phase carbon impact of 95.4t CO2e for each 100 products used over a period of 2 years. Logitech’s internal user model for room VC equipment (based on recorded data from VC room usage)

Since data is considered to be the new oil, good data management is key for businesses operating in Kenya as it enables improved organisational agility, better and faster decision making and quicker problem-solving based on accurate, up-to-date information. There are very few businesses today that do not leverage some elements of data within their day-to-day operations, and organisations now have huge potential to gather, store and analyse data to learn more about consumer behaviour, market trends and other important aspects that have an impact on their operations.

According to DataReportal, there were 17.86 million internet users in Kenya at the start of 2023, with internet penetration at 32.7%, which is one of the highest in East Africa. With the correct data management tools and tactics, businesses in the country can exploit this abundance of data to improve efficiency, cut costs and increase profitability.

Effective data management practices translate into information that is simple to access, to analyse and gain useful insights that can guide business decisions. This may entail spotting patterns, projecting future expansions and highlighting potential improvement zones for the organisation.

Visibility of data assets

Additionally, proper data management can boost the visibility of a company’s data assets, which makes it easier to quickly find the right data for any specific analysis. Data visibility not only allows an enterprise to be more organised and productive, but also enables its employees to find the information they need to better do their jobs.

Unfortunately, many organisations in Kenya – across both the public and private sectors – still lack insight and understanding of where some of their critical data resides. This means that sensitive information can easily end up on unauthorised devices or email accounts outside of the organisation, without the organisation even being aware of this. This naturally increases the chances of a data breach, which can have various negative consequences.

Probably the biggest risk associated with data breaches is reputational damage, which can lead to a loss of existing customers and the inability to attract new ones, which will have an adverse effect on a business’s bottom line. In addition, the loss of sensitive customer data could also result in fines and penalties being levied by regulators, depending on the particular industry sector.

Security and privacy

Data security and privacy are important functions of data management, which should be an important consideration for businesses in Kenya, as there are a growing number of regulations that are being introduced around data and how it should be processed and stored. Effective data management includes deploying the right authentication and encryption tools that are key to protecting an organisation and its employees from data loss, theft and breaches.

Robust data security also ensures that critical enterprise data is backed up and can be recovered in the event that the primary source becomes unavailable. Organisations should also be aware that security becomes increasingly important when their data contains any personally identifiable information that needs to be carefully managed.

However, besides ensuring that effective data management practices are in place, organisations should also review and update these measures regularly to ensure that their sensitive information is always handled and stored securely. Updating and reviewing data management practices is essential in a threat landscape that constantly changes as hackers continue to find creative ways to compromise IT environments.

Ultimately, data management should be top of mind for businesses in Kenya, because when data is organised properly, it is simple to access, analyse and can be used to gain useful insights that can guide business choices that will give an organisation a competitive edge.

In the world of cybersecurity, it is always a challenge to keep up with the evolving threat landscape. As we look into the future, it’s evident that artificial intelligence (AI) will play a growing role in protecting the digital assets of organisations. The adoption of technology will also allow companies to put more time into another crucial aspect of creating a safe online working environment – awareness and education.

With growing demand, it is no surprise that there is a global shortage of skilled cybersecurity talent and the picture is no different in South Africa. This unfortunately leads to situations where organisations spend on security solutions, but fail to configure the products properly, meaning that they do not stand to gain from the full benefits. Here, the addition of AI, machine learning (ML) and automation can help companies make the most of their investment by alerting IT teams of misconfigurations or by allowing them to leverage pre-configured tools.

Indeed, AI is proving itself a powerful tool for identifying and mitigating security risks, and its importance is only set to grow. Let’s explore the AI trends in cybersecurity we can expect to see in 2024:

1. Advanced Threat Detection and Mitigation

In most cases in the past, many threats would have a longer dwell time within an organisation’s digital environment before they were picked up. To counter this, AI-driven threat detection will take a huge leap in the future. These AI systems can rapidly analyse massive datasets, and spot patterns and anomalies that would be nearly impossible for human analysts to detect in a timely manner. As such, ML algorithms will become even more adept at identifying complex, polymorphic threats and zero-day attacks. We are already starting to see this technology in today’s threat detection, investigation, and response (TDIR) tools.

2. AI-Powered Incident Response

AI-driven cybersecurity systems will provide real-time incident monitoring, automatic threat containment, and even autonomous decision-making for certain types of incidents. This swift response capability will help organisations mitigate risks and limit the impact of security breaches.

3. Zero Trust Security

The Zero Trust model, which gained significant traction in recent years, will become the de facto approach to cybersecurity and we will see more AI playing a critical role in continuously verifying and authenticating users and devices within and outside the network. With AI-driven identity and access management, organisations can ensure that only trusted entities have access to critical resources, reducing the attack surface and enhancing security.

4. AI-Enhanced User and Entity Behaviour Analytics

User and entity behaviour analytics (UEBA) will continue to evolve with the help of AI and these systems will not only detect anomalies but also offer more context-aware insights. AI will improve the accuracy of UEBA by providing actions based on AI models such as user roles, sensitivity of data, and device types, leading to more precise threat detection.

5. AI-Generated Threats and Adversarial Machine Learning

In a worrying trend, cybercriminals are increasingly using AI to create sophisticated and convincing threats. To counter this, AI-powered defences will employ adversarial machine learning to detect and defend against AI-generated threats. This cat-and-mouse game between AI attackers and defenders will intensify into an AI vs AI scenario.

7. IoT Security and AI

The proliferation of Internet of Things (IoT) devices presents new security challenges. AI will be used to secure IoT ecosystems by monitoring and analysing the behaviour of connected devices and identifying unusual patterns that could signal potential vulnerabilities or threats.

Strengthening the human firewall

In many instances, South African organisations do not need to go out and spend more in order to benefit from AI capabilities. Rather, they need to take a closer look at their software licences and see what they get. Similar to the misconfigured security tools, here too organisations tend to be unaware that some productivity solutions come with embedded security capabilities out of the box, meaning that they do not need to deploy additional security tools.

The barrier to entry to AI is reducing further as vendors begin including some of these AI-based security capabilities with lower-tier licences as well. Of course, if organisations do not already have access to these technologies, they will need to carry out future procurement with a security-first mindset.

It is crucial to note however that as much as we are seeing a growing role for AI, security remains very much a human-centric initiative. Organisations are protecting themselves from malicious actors who are humans (even if assisted by technology) and also have to work with the humans within the organisation who have a major role to play in maintaining a safe environment. The advent of AI-driven cybersecurity means that security experts can offload a portion of their workload to technology, and use the freed-up time to become more proactive in bolstering the organisation’s internal defences.

This includes having more free time to focus on employee awareness and education, putting in place the processes and procedures that employees are familiar with and making it easy for them to know exactly who to contact and what to do in case they have any concerns around cybersecurity, are facing some kind of cyber threat or feel they might have been compromised through social engineering attacks, phishing or more. As much as technology is advancing, the human aspect remains at the forefront of cybersecurity.