Report by Exabeam
From Adoption to Accountability: The New Economics of AI in Cybersecurity
Key Findings
87% of security leaders express confidence that their cybersecurity investments are delivering business value.
59% of security leaders report using outcome metrics to measure cybersecurity investments.
AI and automation serve as the primary catalyst for cybersecurity budget expansion for 44% of organizations, followed by cloud infrastructure growth (33%) and mainstream business AI adoption (32%).
95% of organizations are increasing cybersecurity budgets in 2026.
74% of organizations are seeing double-digit cybersecurity budget growth in 2026.
30% of security leaders in the Netherlands report that AI is already improving security operations.
30% of security leaders cite a lack of board understanding of the link between cybersecurity investment and business resilience as their biggest challenge in defending spend.
32% of organizations identify AI as the most challenging cybersecurity spend to justify to business stakeholders.
44% of organizations identify AI as the top driver of cybersecurity budget increases.
63% of security leaders report using quantified ROI to measure cybersecurity investments.
75% of security leaders in Saudi Arabia report that AI is already improving security operations.
44% of organizations would cut AI investment first if cybersecurity budgets tightened.
27% of security leaders in Japan report that AI is already improving security operations.