IT Security Spending grows to Counter Advanced Threat Realities

Money funded on IT security systems is definitely no guarantee of a full proof security but going by what trends say, it is surely occupying a major and important chunk of budget allocation and rightly so. A new IT security spending forecast from International Data Corp. (IDC) suggests some staggering numbers.

IDC is forecasting that worldwide spending on security-related hardware, software, and services will increase from from $73.7 billion in 2016 to $101.6 billion in 2020. That forecast represents a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 8.3 percent, which IDC notes is more than twice the rate of overall IT spending growth over that same five-year forecast period. In India alone, Data Breach is big. The average cost incurred by Indian enterprises for a data breach has shot up to 9.73 crore this year from 8.85 crore last year, making India the most targeted country for data breaches in the world, says a study by IBM and the Ponemon Institute.

India’s expenditure on cyber security is expected to grow about ninefold from over $4 billion to $35 billion by 2025 . Inspite of the heavy duty spending on IT security, most Indian organisations are still skeptical of their ability to sense, resist and respond to cyber threats. Also, this being a very crucial time keeping the Indian scenario in mind. With digital being extensively promoted, the need for cyber security is at an all time high.

IDC says security-related services, which will account for nearly 45 percent of all security spending worldwide; followed by security software.

IDC also identifies that maximum IT security spending is coming from banking industry followed by discrete manufacturing, federal/central government, and process manufacturing. These four industries will deliver 37% of worldwide security revenues this year as well as through the next five years, says IDC.

Add it all up and it’s clear that in terms of new budget allocations organizations of all sizes are ratcheting up investments in IT security. In fact, multiple surveys at this point suggest that in the face of attacks that are increasing in both volume and sophistication IT security by a wide margin is now the highest spending priority for most organizations. Among information security priorities over the next 12 months, business continuity and disaster recovery which are at the heart of an organization’s ability to react to an attack is a top priority, along with data leakage and data loss protection

For IT security professionals that increased level of spending represents both an opportunity to better defend their organizations and validation. IT security professionals have been warning about the perils of underfunding IT security for years. Now that the consequences of that lack of funding are become apparently to all.

Anshuman Singh
Senior Director Product Management
Barracuda Networks