, which revealed that South African organizations faced an average data breach cost of R49.45 million in 2023.
The majority of cyber threats in South Africa resulted from stolen or compromised credentials and phishing scams, constituting 14% each as the initial attack vectors. Pinto suggested modernizing perimeter security strategies using zero-trust security solutions underpinned by AI and automation to increase cyber resiliency and manage risks in compliance with data privacy policies like the Protection of Personal Information Act .The report emphasized that AI and automation had a significant impact on the speed of breach identification and containment for studied organizations.
Despite this, only 28% of surveyed organizations extensively implemented these technologies, indicating a substantial opportunity for organizations to enhance detection and response speeds.Chris McCurdy, General Manager, Worldwide IBM Security Services, highlighted the importance of early detection and fast response in cybersecurity.