Hi and welcome to Cyber Reasons Malicious Life. I'm Ryan Levy.

Israel is a small country. From anywhere in it, here are only just about half an hour from the nearest border.

It's also small in terms of population, with roughly 9 million people, it's even smaller than cities like London, Bangkok and Tehran.

Yet in spite of its modest size, Israel is a global tech hub.

Over the years, it gave birth to many important technological innovations,

like ICQ, the first global instant messaging service,

the first USB discount key storage. First Global Instant Message Message Message Storage Device in the early 2000s

and Waze in What's Up in more recent years.

Many leading global technology companies from Intel to Microsoft to Google have major

innovation centers in various cities around the country.

How did such small country become a technology powerhouse?

It's a question that intrigued quite a few researchers and authors over the years.

One key factor is a highly educated and skilled workforce.

According to Deloitte, a major consulting and accounting firm,

quote, Israel enjoys the highest percentage of engineers and scientists per capita in the world,

and one of the highest ratios of university degrees and academic publications per capita."

End quote. Another important contribution per capita."

Another important contribution was a strategic decision by the Israeli government in the early

1990s to invest heavily in technology incubator programs,

which according to Deloitte led to more than 1100 new projects and companies over the years.

Israel's booming cyber security industry is a particularly fascinating part of this overall success. Israeli private companies like Checkpoint, Cyber Arc, and Cyber Reason

our show's sponsors are widely regarded as industry leaders. The cyber operations of the Israeli Mossad are whispered throughout the globe

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