The DNC (Democratic National Committee) hack was a reminder that a breach in digital security can have both domestic and global impact. The use of advanced technology has come with its own set of drawbacks, and cyber-attacks is one of them. With the wide adoption of cloud computing, enterprise mobility and IoT, end-users have been exposed to a number of security threats and vulnerabilities. This is why more and more e-commerce companies, banks, and government organizations are establishing digital security solutions in order to safeguard critical data. In fact, in 2015, the global digital security market stood at $19.79 billion, and, according to analysts at Technavio, will grow at a CAGR close to 12% by 2020.
Graph designed by Technavio; data sourced from http://www.businessinsider.in/.
When seen from a geographical point of view, North America accounts for the largest share of the digital security market, followed by Europe and APAC. The recent hacking of the DNC, the formal governing body of the United States Democratic Party, reflects how cyber-attacks are no longer limited to security organizations and banks. Regarded as one of the most critical cyber attacks of 2016, the leaking of DNC emails just months before the Presidential elections shows how geopolitical conflict can lead to attempts to bring political instability in democracy.
2015 saw the threat intelligence and analytics segment accounting for the largest share of the global digital security market, followed by endpoint security and content security gateways. As adoption of advanced technologies such as cloud, BYOD (bring your own device), and big data analytics becomes increasingly popular, enterprises are looking for data protection against various security threats, malware attacks, and vulnerabilities. Security breaches not only result in the loss of critical and confidential data, but also damage reputations. This is why investment in threat intelligence and analytics has grown substantially over the past few years and will continue to do so during the forecast period.
When it comes to the endpoint security segment, it is important to understand that security solutions positioned at the network level are insufficient in rendering the system attack-proof. Also, as there has been an increase in the number of desktop, smartphone, and tablets users, switching to digital security solutions has become critical. With the majority of these attacks coming from the web, sectors that deal with highly critical data such as finance, intelligence, and defence are the greatest adopters of these security solutions.
Content security gateways, M2M (machine to machine) network security, emails and cloud computing are the other major segments that demand aggressive adoption of digital security solutions. With the emergence of IoT, the demand for M2M solutions is growing at a much faster rate. This has fuelled the recent trend towards the introduction of multi-factor authentication. Multi-factor authentication involves using two or more unique authentication methods for identity verification, so as to provide an additional layer of security and thereby prevent any unauthorized access to a physical location, database, or computing device. It is expected that leading vendors will being offering multi-factor authentication solutions for securing data transmission between connected devices over a network.
Some of the leading vendors in the global digital security market include Cisco Systems, McAfee, Symantec, Trend Micro and Gemalto.
