Around three quarters (74%) of IT security professionals are more concerned about cyberattacks on critical infrastructure than an enterprise data breach, a study from Claroty claims.
The study comprised of responses from 1,000 IT security professionals across the US, UK, Germany, France and Australia on the attitudes and concerns on IT systems.
Its data shows that 51% of professionals in the US believe industrial networks are not properly safeguarded and need more protection. A further 55% believe the US’ critical infrastructure is vulnerable to an attack.
When asked what the biggest threats were, 65% were most concerned about an attack on critical infrastructure, while only 35% were most worried about an enterprise data breach. Moving on from this, 67% believe a cyberattack on critical infrastructure could inflict more damage than a data breach.
Worryingly, 63% of US IT security professionals expect a major cyberattack to be successfully carried out on national infrastructure within the next five years. Only 10% believe there will never be an attack.
Moving globally, 62% of the respondents from the UK, Germany, France and Australia believe industrial networks are securely safeguarded. Respondents from Australia and Germany were the most confident with 93% and 96%, respectively, stating this.
Claroty chief security officer Dave Weinstein said, “While IT and OT convergence unlocks business value in terms of operations efficiency, performance, and quality of services, it can now be detrimental because threats, both targeted and non-targeted, have the freedom to manoeuvre from IT to OT environments and vice versa.
“Our mission is to help security practitioners to bridge the gap between IT and OT cybersecurity, ensuring that all bases are protected from cyberattack. This is even more critical in this new normal of largely remote workforces, which create additional burden on CISOs to remotely secure their production environments.”
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