Only one-third of UK organizations have a validated plan in place to handle cyberwarfare; and 57 percent have stalled or stopped digital transformation projects due to the threat of cyberwarfare.
These are key findings from the Armis State of Cyberwarfare and Trends Report: 2022-2023, which measures global IT and security professionals’ perceptions of cyberwarfare.
The report found that while 84 percent of UK organizations claimed they had programmes and practices in place to respond to cyberwarfare threat, only one-third (32 percent) said their plans are validated by best practice frameworks, which is less than the global average of nearly 40 percent.
The growing threat of cyberwarfare
The Russian invasion of Ukraine has not only tragically upended the lives of countless people, but it is also causing geopolitical shockwaves of cyberwarfare that will reverberate for the foreseeable future. Today’s targets extend well beyond the higher levels of the opposition governments; any organization is a potential victim, with critical infrastructure and high-value entities at the top of the list.
The study showed that cyberwarfare was one of the lowest-ranking priorities for UK organizations – despite a majority of organizations (59 percent) agreeing that the threat of cyberwarfare has increased since the start of the Ukrainian conflict, and 62 percent claiming to be somewhat or very concerned about the threat of cyberwarfare on their organizations.
42 percent of surveyed UK security professionals claimed to have had to report an incident of cyberwarfare to authorities, which is significantly higher than the European average of one-third of companies, but lower than the global average of 45 percent. A further 28 percent of UK organizations reported more threat activity on their networks in the past six months compared with the six months prior.
