Only 20 percent IT managers believe they have a skilled team in place to properly detect, investigate and respond to cybersecurity incidents

Key Survey Findings:

• IT teams spend 26 percent of their time managing security, yet still struggle with a lack of expertise, budget and up to date technology
• 66 percent IT managers said their organization’s cybersecurity budget (including people/technology) is below what it needs to be
• 75 percent IT managers believe staying up to date with cybersecurity technology is a challenge

Sri Lanka – July 16, 2019 – Sophos (LSE: SOPH), a global leader in network and endpoint security, today announced the findings of its global survey, The Impossible Puzzle of Cybersecurity, which reveals IT managers are inundated with cyberattacks coming from all directions and are struggling to keep up due to a lack of security expertise, budget and up to date technology. The survey polled 3,100 IT decision makers from mid-sized businesses in the US, Canada, Mexico, Colombia, Brazil, UK, France, Germany, Australia, Japan, India, and South Africa.

Lack of Security Expertise, Budget and Up to Date Technology

According to the Sophos survey, IT managers reported that 26 percent of their team’s time is spent managing security, on average. Yet, only 20 percent believe they have strong team in place to detect, investigate and respond to security incidents.

Regarding budget, 66 percent said their organization’s cybersecurity budget (including people and technology) is below what it needs to be. Having current technology in place is another problem, with 75 percent agreeing that staying up to date with cybersecurity technology is a challenge for their organization. This lack of security expertise, budget and up to date technology indicates IT managers are struggling to respond to cyberattacks instead of proactively planning and handling what’s coming next.

“Staying on top of where threats are coming from takes dedicated expertise, but IT managers often have a hard time finding the right talent or don’t have a proper security system in place that allows them to respond quickly and efficiently to attacks,” said Chester Wisniewski, principal research scientist, Sophos. “If organizations can adopt a security system with products that work together to share intelligence and automatically react to threats, then IT security teams can avoid the trap of perpetually catching up after yesterday’s attack and better defend against what’s going to happen tomorrow. Having a security ‘system’ in place helps alleviate the security skills gap IT managers are facing. It’s much more time and cost effective for businesses to grow their security maturity with simple to use tools that coordinate with each other across an entire estate.”

Synchronized Security Solves the Impossible Puzzle of Cybersecurity

With cyberthreats coming from supply chain attacks, phishing emails, software exploits, vulnerabilities, insecure wireless networks, and much more, businesses need a security solution that helps them eliminate gaps and better identify previously unseen threats. Sophos Synchronized Security, a single integrated system, provides this much needed visibility to threats by integrating Sophos endpoint, network, mobile, Wi-Fi, and encryption products to share information in real-time and automatically respond to incidents. More information about Synchronized Security is available at Sophos.com.

The Impossible Puzzle of Cybersecurity survey was conducted by Vanson Bourne, an independent specialist in market research, in December 2018 and January 2019. This survey interviewed 3,100 IT decision makers in 12 countries and across six continents in the US, Canada, Mexico, Colombia, Brazil, UK, France, Germany, Australia, Japan, India, and South Africa. All respondents were from organizations with between 100 and 5,000 employees.