Seven Cyber security trends that India will witness in 2019: PwC’s forecast

By Siddharth Vishwanath, Cyber Security Leader, PwC India

India’s cyber security landscape is going through an interesting phase as businesses are keenly looking at innovative tools to protect themselves from cyber attacks and threats. While India’s cyber security needs are not different from that of the rest of the world, there are a host of areas which require unique approach.

Keeping in mind India’s business landscape and her needs for cyber security tools and solutions, we have zeroed in on seven cyber security trends for the Indian market in 2019.

1. Privacy and personal data protection will be one of the key focus areas in 2019:

With the draft Personal Data Protection Bill and the Aadhaar ruling by the Supreme Court recently limiting the use of data, the focus on data privacy is set to reach a tipping point in 2019.

Organisations will invest in aligning their infrastructure to the requirements in the Personal Data Protection Bill (which is likely to become an Act later in 2019) to gain business edge and avoid penalties.

2. Machine learning (ML)/Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Cyber security will mature and become integral part of the security suite:

ML/AI-enabled solutions will be in great demand in 2019 as organisations will begin to focus on anomaly detection rather than rule based detection and response. We have already seen ML’s application in endpoint security space. 2019 will see ML/ AI being leveraged in the heart of securing networks i.e. integral component of SoC (Security Operation centers).

3. IoT security will emerge as a focus in 2019:

Organisations and government will continue to embrace IoT-enabled solutions to achieve automation and efficiency especially for critical infrastructure and smart cities. While this happens, we should see increased focus across stakeholders on securing IoT infrastructure.

4. Organisations will have renewed focus on cloud security in 2019:

As cloud adoption continues to grow in 2019, attacks on cloud’s shared security model will mount manifold. Cloud providers will have to put in more resources to protect infrastructure. Besides, there will be efforts to beef up understanding about how to limit access to data stored in cloud and let only authorised personnel access it. In order to address vulnerabilities and misconfigurations, organisations will adopt technologies like CASB (cloud access security broker) which come with additional security controls.

5. Integrated approach to managing insider threats:

As we see enhanced focus around repercussions of data breach is increasing significantly, accordingly there is going to be much larger focus on managing insider threats. 2019 will see organisations cross-leveraging or moving towards an integrated data leakage prevention suite which will embed user and entity behavior analytics (UEBA) and cloud access security broker (CASB).

6. Paradigm of security testing will shift left:

Security testing will be embedded in the development cycle as speed to market will become key in the digital era. We will increasingly see security teams becoming part of the app development lifecycle.

7. Blockchain will still remain a solid concept but may play within startup circles only:

While blockchain is expected to prevent access fraud by playing a key role in managing identities, it may still remain as a solid concept and in play within the startup circles. In 2019, we don’t see large blockchain based Identity as a Service (IDaaS) being widespread in organisations.