Cydome and Rakuten create secure digital backbone

A strategic partnership signed between Cydome and Rakuten Maritime this month aims to provide shipping companies with a secure digital backbone to better protect their assets from cyberattacks.

The collaboration integrates Cydome’s class-certified cybersecurity technology into the Rakuten Maritime digital infrastructure platform, enabling multi-layered protection across the entire vessel lifecycle.

“The cooperation comes at a time of escalating maritime threat levels and increased ship connectivity, which is expanding the attack surface,” said Cydome CEO Nir Ayalon, adding that generative AI is transforming how hackers expose system vulnerabilities.

“Attackers are now using AI to identify and exploit vulnerabilities at machine speed, turning new flaws into active threats within hours. This leaves defenders with practically zero time to patch systems. Securing vessels one system at a time with basic firewalls and endpoint antivirus is no longer enough to stop these modern threats.”

Ayalon said that shipping companies need a unified solution, one that is already built for maritime environments, rather than making adaptations and managing fragmented cyber tools.

The Cydome approach secures the vessel from cyber hackers with the best-in-class protection for IT as well as maritime-specific operational technology (OT) that uses unique maritime protocols like NMEA and MODBUS and other proprietary protocols. This is crucial for the ship’s critical functionality and business continuity.

“As vessels become more connected and more regulations are imposed, safeguarding OT is the main concern for maritime companies,” added Ayalon. “Additionally, context-aware AI analyses information from multiple layers of protection simultaneously, identifying the context of events and their impact on the entire ship. This moves beyond standard monitoring of individual assets for disconnected anomalies.”

“By partnering with Rakuten Maritime, we are ensuring that sophisticated, AI-driven protection is accessible to every vessel, regardless of its age, existing architecture, or the technical expertise of the crew onboard,” said Ayalon.

“By automatically learning the behaviour of any third-party device used on the vessel or offshore site, we can provide asset owners with an advanced future-proofed security solution for existing and new software and digital platforms.”

Rakuten Maritime and Cydome share a common vision: making cybersecurity a foundational layer of modern maritime operations.

“Through this collaboration, we are closing critical security gaps across the entire vessel lifecycle from ship design to daily operations helping shipowners and operators build more secure, resilient, and future-ready fleets,” said Ryan Son, President of Internet Services Business Unit at Rakuten Symphony and Head of Rakuten Maritime.

As part of the collaboration agreement, Rakuten Maritime can offer Cydome’s 24/7 managed SOC services for maritime cybersecurity. Maritime cyber experts constantly monitor vessels, address issues, and help teams mitigate incidents faster and more accurately to minimise operational impact.

With automated risk scoring and a single fleet-wide risk management dashboard, the Cydome and Rakuten Maritime collaboration makes risk management and compliance easier. The companies say this helps shipping companies confidently pass audits and comply with all mandatory requirements without adding administrative burden.