Canalys reveals its six hottest cybersecurity solutions for 2021

Analyst believes global cybersecurity spending will rocket by 10 per cent after data breaches and ransomware attacks hit all-time high

Web and email security, identity access management and end point security have been tipped to be among the hottest areas in cybersecurity for 2021, according to Canalys.

The analyst firm expects global cybersecurity spending to increase by 10 per cent worldwide to $60bn as a "best-case scenario" this year, driven by an expanding threat landscape and an increasing frequency of breaches and cyberattacks.

Even in a worst-case scenario, which assumes a more severe economic impact from national lockdowns and the possible emergence of new strains of the Covid virus, Canalys' forecast predicts a 6.6 per cent increase in cybersecurity spending.

The analyst firm identified six areas of cybersecurity which will see the highest spending growth in 2021.

Web and email security is tipped to be the highest growing area, with spending expected to increase by 12.5 per cent in 2021 under Canalys' best-case scenario. Vulnerability and security analytics comes second with 11 per cent spending growth, followed by endpoint security (10.4 per cent), identity access management (10.4 per cent), network security (eight per cent) and data security (6.6 per cent).

Cybersecurity spending has remained resilient during the Covid crisis, claims Canalys. The number of data breaches and ransomware attacks reached an all-time high in 2020. More than 12 billion records containing personal identifiable information were reportedly compromised throughout the year, while ransomware attacks increased by 60 per cent.

"The biggest threats are always those not yet known. The discovery of the Sunburst advanced persistent threat campaign at the end of 2020, stemming from malicious code injected into the widely used SolarWinds Orion IT management platform and subsequent infiltration into other systems, highlights this," said Matthew Ball, chief analyst at Canalys.

"Cybersecurity professional services engagements in response to this latest issue will be one of many factors contributing to sustained investment this year, especially in newer solutions to mitigate emerging threats. Growth in add-on subscriptions providing new features, products to secure the cloud and delivered from the cloud, and upgrades to existing solutions will be key drivers for expansion. The need for organizations to adopt multi-layered and holistic approaches, combining employee awareness training, data protection and backup, threat and vulnerability detection, and response will remain critical."