A recent study by Kaspersky revealed that the retail industry has suffered the most cyber breaches in APAC in the past 24 months. The study, based on 234 respondents in the region, also revealed that 19% of companies experienced cyber incidents due to insufficient cybersecurity investment in the last two years.
Retail industry
The retail industry experienced the most number of cyber incidents because of the insufficient cyber security budget (37%), followed by telecommunication companies (33%) and the critical infrastructure, energy, oil and gas sector (23%).
“E-commerce is expected to be a 2.05 trillion USD market in Asia Pacific towards the end of 2023. Retail being the industry that suffered most cyber incidents makes sense, as cybercriminals follow the money trail. These companies are part of the greater digitalisation movement in the region and hold treasure troves of data, specifically financial ones,” said Adrian Hia, managing director for Asia Pacific at Kaspersky.
Cybersecurity investment
Around 16% of respondents admit they lack a budget for adequate cybersecurity measures.
In the next 12 to 18 months, companies are willing to invest in cybersecurity through threat detection software (46%), training for cybersecurity professionals (50%), and educational programs for general staff (46%). Some organisations plan to introduce endpoint protection software (42%), hire additional IT professionals (37%) and adopt SaaS cloud solutions (45%).
“Today, companies must align cybersecurity investment with a business strategy and consider cybersecurity one of their business goals. Of course, investments must justify themselves and be effective, so the information security department also faces the task of increasing the ROI of investments in information security and defending investments to senior management or the board of directors,” comments Ivan Vassunov, VP of Corporate Products at Kaspersky.