Results from Hiscox’s 2019 Cyber Readiness report show cyber security spending across 5,400 organisations increased significantly from the previous year, with total expenditure reaching $7.9 billion.
After adjusting for the increased size of the study group in this year’s report, the total spend represents a rise of just under 20% on the equivalent 2018 figure, with spending heavily weighted to the biggest firms.
Across the study group, there was a marked rise in overall spending on IT – up from an average $11.2 million last year to $14.7 million this year.
The report says this is largely explained by the first-time inclusion of France, where the average IT budget is $24.5 million.
The percentage of IT budgets spent on cyber is marginally lower than before – accounting for 9.9% of the total IT spend compared with 10.5% the previous year – but by value it is up nearly a quarter (24%), to $1.46 million.
The inclusion of Belgium and France this year also skewed the numbers to the high side. The average spend on cyber security by Belgian companies is $1.77 million and for French companies it is $2.1 million. Both figures are well above the average for the seven countries examined in the report.
72% of US firms plan to increase their security spending – the highest proportion amongst the seven countries – whilst two-thirds of respondents say they plan to increase their spending on cyber by 5% or more in the year ahead.
UK organisations were shown to have the lowest cyber security budgets with less than $900,000 on average, compared with an average across the study group of $1.46 million.
Meanwhile the mean cost of all incidents for UK firms was below average for the survey: $243,000 compared with $369,000.
