Study finds universal shortage of cybersecurity staff

More than 1,400 security professionals based across the Asia Pacific (APAC), US, and UK provided answers on the impact that automation and artificial intelligence (AI) will have on the staffing of cybersecurity functions. All respondents in the study are responsible for recruiting, hiring, promoting and retaining cybersecurity staff within their organisations.
Results clearly indicated a shortage of cybersecurity staff across geographical regions with 78 per cent of all respondents admitting their teams were understaffed).
According to respondents, automation will provide a partial solution to the problem, relieving cybersecurity professionals of time-consuming and non-cost-effective tasks, such as malware analysis, which is either already automated (50 per cent), or is planned to become so in the next three years (56 per cent).
Only 35 per cent of respondents, however, think that automation will reduce the headcount of their cybersecurity function: 40 per cent even expect an increased need for hires with more advanced technical skills.
“Within just one year, the perspective around adoption of automated technologies has notably shifted among cybersecurity professionals,” said Dr Larry Ponemon, chairman and founder of the Ponemon Institute.
“Contrary to the popular belief that the rise of automation will threaten the job market, organisations now feel these technologies will help ease the current strain on resources, and offer the potential to promote job security for highly skilled staff, while strengthening cybersecurity defences.”
UK and US respondents were much more confident that automation will improve their cybersecurity staff’s ability to do their job (59 per cent and 65 per cent of respondents, respectively) than were APAC respondents (48 per cent), who were also more likely to distrust AI as a cybersecurity tool (37 per cent of respondents, compared to 31 per cent in the UK and 24 per cent in the US).