Global cybersecurity leaders say they feel unprepared for attack

A majority of global chief information security officers (CISOs) surveyed as part of a report released Wednesday said they feel their organizations are unprepared to face a cyberattack, despite many believing they will face an attack in the next year.

The report, compiled by cybersecurity group Proofpoint, was based on a survey of 1,400 CISOs in 14 different countries including the United States. The results highlighted a brutal year for security professionals struggling to cope during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Organizational cyber preparedness is still a major concern, and more than a year into this pandemic, it really changed the threat landscape, 66 percent of CISOs feel their organization is unprepared to cope with a targeted cyberattack in 2021,” Lucia Milică, global resident CISO at Proofpoint and the report’s lead author, told The Hill ahead of the report’s release.

The findings of the survey revealed that CISOs are overworked and overwhelmed after a year in which the COVID-19 pandemic pushed more daily activities online, giving cyber criminals more targets for attack.