Over 82% of business executives in India foresee an increase in cybersecurity budgets in 2023: PwC survey

Even as organisations worry more about threats and cyber events, about 50% of Indian enterprises believe they have fully mitigated their cybersecurity risk exposure in a number of critical areas, according to PwC Global Digital Trust Insights – India edition. As many as 83% of Indian business executives who took part in the survey said their organisation’s cybersecurity team has improved supply chain risk management.

Indian respondents consider a catastrophic cyberattack, a resurgence of Covid-19 or a new health crisis, and a new geopolitical conflict as the top three risks. The Global Threat survey includes 3,522 respondents across 65 countries, including over 100 from India.

“The digitalisation of business demands that corporates and boards invest in becoming more cyber resilient. This needs to be across the spectrum – in technology, people, processes and engineering capabilities. Our survey clearly reveals that organisations that have made cybersecurity a strategic priority have witnessed less disruption to business. Cyber resilience is not only key to survival of businesses but also a key driver of public trust,” said Sivarama Krishnan, partner and APAC cybersecurity leader at PwC.

Key findings:

Steps taken to mitigate cyber risks


Enabling remote and hybrid work (57% say the cyber risk is fully mitigated); accelerated cloud adoption (61%); increased use of the internet of things (67%); increased digitisation of supply chains (52%); and back office operations (56%).

65% of surveyed business executives feel cybercriminals will significantly affect their organisation in 2023 compared to 2022. In India, cloud-based pathways (59%) and the internet of things (58%) are top areas of concern, followed by mobile devices and software supply chains (54% each).

89% of Indian respondents said their organisation’s cybersecurity team detected a significant cyberthreat to business and prevented it from affecting their operations, as against 70% globally.

Most organisations are increasing their cyber budgets:

Majority of executives surveyed said their organisations are continuing to increase their cyber budgets – 69% said the budget increased in 2022 and 65% plan to spend more on cyber in 2023.

52% CEOs said they will drive major initiatives to improve their organisation’s cyber posture.

Organisations are also planning to increase their cyber focus, including cyber technology solutions (39%), focus on strategy and coordination with engineering/operations (37%) and upskilling and hiring of cyber talent (36%).

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