Educational systems have advanced with the use of electronic learning (e-learning), which is a promising solution for long-distance learners. Students who engage in e-learning can access tests and exams online, making education more flexible and accessible. This work reports on the design of an e-learning system that makes recommendations to students to improve their learning. This artificial intelligence-based student assessment and recommendation (AISAR) system consists of score estimation, clustering, performance prediction, and recommendation. In addition, the importance of student authentication is recognised in situations in which students must authenticate themselves prior to using the e-learning system using their identity, password, and personal identification number. Individual scores are determined using a recurrent neural network (RNN) based on student engagement and examination scores. Then, a density-based spatial clustering algorithm (DBSCAN) using Mahalanobis distance clustering is implemented to group students based on their obtained score values. The constructed clusters are validated by estimating purity and entropy. Student performance is predicted using a threshold-based MapReduce (TMR) procedure from the score-based cluster. When predicting student performance, students are classified into two groups: average and poor, with the former being divided into below- and above-average students and the latter into poor and very poor students. This categorisation aims to provide useful recommendations for learning. A recommendation reinforcement learning algorithm, the rule-based state–action–reward–state–action (R-SARSA) algorithm, is incorporated for evaluation. Students were required to work on their subjects according to the provided recommendations. This e-learning recommendation system achieves better performance in terms of true-positives, false-positives, true-negatives, false-negatives, precision, recall, and accuracy.

This study aims to explore the challenges and issues in adopting cybersecurity practices in smart Saudi cities and to develop and validate a newly developed cybersecurity-based unified theory of acceptance and use of technology 3 (UTAUT3) model. The study has a twofold purpose. First, it identified the key challenges and issues in adopting smart cities in Saudi smart cities. Second, it developed a technology-based model to adopt cybersecurity practices in Saudi smart cities. Two surveys were conducted to achieve these objectives. The first survey identified challenges and gaps in adopting cybersecurity practices in smart cities, revealing concerns about weak cybersecurity platforms, privacy breaches, and the impact of IT infrastructure advancements on Saudi culture (N = 554: common public). The second survey focused on developing and validating a cybersecurity-based UTAUT3 model (N = 108: IT professionals), emphasizing nine factors: performance expectancy, effort expectancy, social influence, facilitating conditions, safety, resiliency, availability, confidentiality, and integrity of cybersecurity. The model’s validity and reliability were assessed, demonstrating its potential for understanding user behavior and adoption patterns in smart cities. The study findings provide valuable insights into the factors influencing the adoption of cybersecurity measures in smart Saudi cities, highlighting the need for targeted strategies, effective awareness programs, and collaboration between stakeholders to promote a secure and resilient digital environment. Future research may focus on refining the model, extending its applicability to other regions or countries, and investigating the impact of emerging technologies and evolving cyber threats on user behavior and cybersecurity practices.

The Internet of Things (IoT) is a revolutionary concept that heavily relies on the network infrastructure to connect large number of devices whose main purpose is to collect data and communicate among one another in the bid to enhance their decision-making capabilities. However, with this great evolution comes various challenges that threatens the information technology industry; these include security and privacy issues. The presence of a large number of interconnected technologies open a grey area in the IT field which has been worsened by the lack of capacity of various institutions to identify, assess and monitor important components to ensure compliance with security policies. Thus, there is need for a clear understanding of the issues at hand and how they can be solved in order to fully harness this capability.

Vehicular Ad-Hoc Network (VANET) will pave the way to advance automotive safety and occupant convenience. The potential VANET applications present diverse requirements. VANET shows unique characteristics and presents a set of challenges. The proposed VANET applications demand reliable and proficient message dissemination techniques. Routing techniques proposed for Mobile Ad-Hoc Network (MANET) do not cater for the characteristics of VANET. The need for novel routing techniques, exclusively designed for VANET has been recognised. This paper analyses different routing techniques proposed specifically for VANET. Unique characteristics of VANET pose challenges to traditional layered architecture where different layers make independent decisions. Mobility, absence of global view of network, random changes in topology, poor link quality and varied channel conditions have encouraged the paradigm shift to cross-layer approach. In order to optimise the performance of VANET, architectures based on cross-layer approach have been proposed by the researchers. The paper also surveys such cross-layer paradigm based solutions for VANET and concludes with an analytical summary.

Saudi Arabia has a goal of ensuring that it has at least two cities among the top 100 smart cities of the future. However, increasing connectivity and incorporation of smart solutions in cities still raises concerns over cyber security with threats arising daily including denial of services and phishing as some of the most significant. Saudi Arabia, therefore, needs a cybersecurity policy framework that will ensure effective protection for all stakeholders in the smart city from these cyber threats. User acceptance is foremost important in any new technology, including smart-cities. Due to ongoing cyber threats and in the absence of an efficient cyber policies, Saudi end-user community is not keen to accept newer technologies where their interaction with online medium is required. The proliferation of smart cities globally affords the opportunity to analyze and compare the efforts made in Saudi Arabia with other nations like the USA, India and Singapore which is the premier smart city model in the globe currently. This review looks at the similarities and differences between KSA’s cyber security policy framework with these three nations. The review will note some of the defining characteristics and approaches to cyber security in the smart cities of USA, India, and Singapore. After reviewing the current framework in Saudi Arabia, this paper will make suggestions such as updating Saudi’s cybercrime legislation like in the US or formulating a master cyber security plan as seen in Singapore that will improve KSA’s framework creating the best framework model for cyber security in its smart cities.