Over 100 engineers, cybersecurity experts, and business representatives gathered at the first community event hosted by Viettel Cyber Security (VCS) in the Philippines – VCS: CTRL Manila 2025. This marks the first time a foreign cybersecurity company has organized a large-scale program for professionals in the country.
Discussions on APTs, AI-driven financial fraud, and approaches to security vulnerabilities, presented by experts from Vietnam and the Philippines, garnered significant attention.
“In many aspects, the Philippines is in a similar stage to Vietnam a few years ago. The time will come when businesses here understand why security is essential and requires more investment,” commented Mr. Thomas Luu, VCS’s Regional Director for the Philippines.
Affirming Position in the Philippines
VCS: CTRL Manila 2025 is just one of Viettel Cyber Security’s recent activities in the Philippines. The success of the event is steadily building a foothold for Vietnam’s leading security company on its path to global expansion.
After more than two years of presence, VCS has become one of the most active foreign cybersecurity entities in the Philippines, serving numerous clients in sectors such as banking, finance, insurance, healthcare, and small and medium-sized enterprises.
According to Mr. Thomas Luu, many large organizations in the Philippines have begun to invest seriously in cybersecurity, but a segment of other businesses still doesn’t know where to start. This disparity creates a gap that VCS can fill with its practical implementation experience from Vietnam.
One of the key factors that has helped VCS quickly gain attention in the market of 117 million people is its continuous presence at major security events, especially those with a “real-world combat” element. For two consecutive years, young engineers from VCS have won the ROOTCON Hacking Conference, the largest hacking competition in the Philippines.
In parallel with client support, VCS also continuously organizes workshops, training sessions, and attack simulations for businesses, helping them understand the nature of threats and how to build defense capabilities from the ground up, as seen in event series like From Chaos to Control and GovX.0.
Sharing with local media, Mr. Thomas Luu stated his goal for VCS to collaborate with the Philippines to become one of Asia’s cybersecurity hubs, while also developing more products and empowering local personnel for growth.
Global Expansion of a Vietnamese Cybersecurity Company
Viettel Cyber Security’s presence in the Philippines in 2025 also marks a significant transformation for Vietnam’s information security industry, as a domestic enterprise expands globally with internationally recognized capabilities and expert teams.
The main reason for VCS’s acceptance by the local community is largely due to its solid foundation: a team of experts whose capabilities have reached world-class levels for many years.
In the last three years, VCS engineers have continuously appeared on the international cybersecurity map. This team won Pwn2Own, the world’s most prestigious vulnerability exploitation competition, in Toronto 2023 and Ireland 2024. VCS experts have also discovered nearly 500 zero-day vulnerabilities, presented at Black Hat USA and SECCON, and hold numerous top certifications such as CISSP, CCSP, and CEH.
According to a VCS representative, the company always focuses on a philosophy of sustainable development with people as the core. The unit also intends to pursue this philosophy in all markets it enters.
Here, the company collaborates with Rizal Technological University, Makati University, and the ROOTCON community, one of Asia’s largest cybersecurity communities, to organize training, workshops, attack simulations, and awareness programs.
Building a local team also helps VCS overcome a major barrier faced by many foreign providers, as Philippine businesses tend to trust technical teams that understand local culture, processes, and infrastructure. This also demonstrates VCS’s global vision of expanding through knowledge and human capability, rather than solely relying on commercial presence.
With a strong technical foundation and a people-centric strategy, VCS views the Philippines as a stepping stone for global market expansion. “We want to prove that a Vietnamese cybersecurity company can absolutely provide world-class capabilities,” affirmed Mr. Thomas.
