Arab News | Companies, tech specialists, and global hackathon winners at Riyadh UNESCO forum

RIYADH: More than 20 companies were awarded artificial intelligence ethics badges by the Saudi Data and AI Authority (SDAIA) during the fourth UNESCO Global Forum on the Ethics of Artificial Intelligence (GFEAI 2026), leading a series of major honors presented throughout the four-day event, the Saudi Press Agency (SPA) reported.

The companies received AI ethics badges recognizing their efforts to apply ethical and regulatory principles in developing and delivering AI products and services.

The corporate recognitions headlined a series of awards made on the sidelines of the international gathering, which also recognized professional technical talent and young global innovators.

Earlier in the forum, SDAIA honored 52 recipients of certified professional badges in data and artificial intelligence, according to SPA.

SDAIA Vice President Sami Moquim presented the credentials to specialists who passed rigorous examinations benchmarked against international standards.

Spanning two main tracks—Data Scientist and AI Engineer—across Assistant, Associate, and Expert levels, the credentialing program aims to spotlight national technical competencies and align workforce capabilities with market demands.

Global youth talent was also celebrated during the event, as SDAIA, the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), and the International Center for AI Research and Ethics (ICAIRE) honored the winning teams of the AI Readiness Hackathon.

The competition gathered university students from Saudi Arabia and across the globe to build prototype solutions addressing key challenges in education, healthcare, agriculture, and finance. Entries were evaluated on innovation, applicability, societal impact, and adherence to ethical standards.

The four-day forum, hosted by Saudi Arabia from Sept. 14 to 17, concluded Thursday with participants examining how to turn high-level AI ethics principles into actionable governance, industry applications, and measurable benchmarks.

Bringing together policymakers, researchers, global organizations, and industry executives, the gathering served to bolster international cooperation while highlighting Saudi Arabia’s expanding initiatives to cultivate home-grown technical capabilities and anchor ethical frameworks across the technology landscape, SPA noted.