Cybersecurity spending will reach $1 trillion in the next 5 years

Worldwide spending on cybersecurity is predicted to top $1 trillion for the five-year period from 2017 to 2021, according to the Cybersecurity Market Report, published by Cybersecurity Ventures. The projections are driven by a huge increase in the costs suffered by businesses and governments globally as a result of cybercriminal activity.

It was only a year and a half ago when British insurer Lloyd’s reported that cybercrime was costing businesses $400 to $500 billion annually. Later in 2015, Juniper Research upped those numbers, stating the rapid digitization of consumers’ lives and enterprise records will increase the cost of data breaches to $2.1 trillion globally by 2019. Microsoft’s CEO, Satya Nadella, trumped both of those reports and estimated $3 trillion of market value was destroyed in 2015 as a result of cybercrime.

What we have to keep in mind is tracking cybersecurity spending may be the most difficult IT category to track. This increases the need to employ more cybersecurity analysts. Security embeds into all IT categories and is not always broken out on its own. Also, it crosses into non-IT centric markets that include aviation, automobiles and other markets that also embed security solutions. Moreover, there are billions of IoT (Internet of Things) devices with embedded and more often, unprotected security which has generated a whole new genre of vendors.

“IT analyst forecasts are unable to keep pace with the dramatic rise in cybercrime, the ransomware epidemic, the refocusing of malware from PCs and laptops to smartphones and mobile devices, the deployment of billions of under-protected Internet of Things (IoT) devices, the legions of hackers-for-hire, and the more sophisticated cyber-attacks launching at businesses, governments, educational institutions, and consumers globally” according to the new report.

Other interesting figures from the Q2 2016 Cybersecurity Market Report that caught my attention and tie to the cybersecurity spending trend include:

• The U.S. government has increased its annual cybersecurity budget by 35 percent, to $19 billion in 2017
• J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. has doubled its cybersecurity budget from $250 million to a half-billion annually

• Bank of America states it has an “unlimited budget” when it comes to combating cybercrime

• IBM Security, now a $2 billion business, grew by 18 percent in Q1 2016

• BI Intelligence estimates $655 billion will be spent on cybersecurity initiatives to protect PCs, mobile devices and IoT devices between 2015 and 2020.
• In 2004 the global cybersecurity market was worth just $3.5 billion – and by 2015 it had reached $75 billion

One thing is for sure – if the cybercrime outbreak continues, then by 2020 we might be looking at a multi-trillion dollar market. This is why doubling down on cybersecurity might be a smart bet for your business.

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