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Cybersecurity|World Economic Forum|Artificial Intelligence
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cybersecurity|world-economic-forum-organization|artificial-intelligence

AI biggest driver of change in cybersecurity, boosting response and resilience – WEF

5th May 2026

By: Schalk Burger

Creamer Media Senior Deputy Editor

     

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Organisations deploying AI strategically are achieving significant advantages, and 77% of organisations already use AI in their cyber operations, global organisation the World Economic Forum’s (WEF’s) 'AI and Cyber: Empowering Defenders' report shows.

AI is rapidly reshaping cybersecurity and is the biggest driver of change in the field, and the report highlights measurable gains in cost reduction, response speed and resilience.

Organisations that extensively leverage AI in security reduce average breach costs by up to $1.9-million and shorten breach lifecycles by an estimated 80 days, the WEF says.

“While threat actors increasingly weaponise AI to automate deception, generate malware and scale attacks at machine speed, AI has the potential to shift the balance towards defenders,” says WEF Centre for Cybersecurity head Akshay Joshi.

“Organisations that treat it as a strategic capability, rather than a standalone tool, will be better placed to turn growing cyber risk into resilience and competitive advantage.”

As enterprise attack surfaces expand to include hundreds of thousands of Internet-facing assets, the scale and complexity of cyber risk are increasing significantly.

The report highlights that AI’s value in cybersecurity lies in augmenting human expertise, accelerating decisions and strengthening resilience, rather than automation only.

The impact depends on clear AI deployment strategy, rigorously tested use cases before scaling, and strong governance and human oversight from the outset, the WEF says.

The report calls on business and government leaders to treat AI as a foundational security capability, and invest not only in technology, but also in the skills, processes and governance required to defend at machine speed, as cyber risks become more complex.

Edited by Chanel de Bruyn
Creamer Media Online Managing Editor

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