The survey — which was conducted in partnership with Censuswide, the research firm — presented over 100 UK-based C-suites working in large companies or enterprises with a series of questions relating to their business’ cyber preparedness.

On top of discovering that just 47% of business leaders think their business has adequate cybersecurity budgets, over a third (39%) feel their organisation isn’t suitably primed to respond to a cyber breach.

Further, 35% of leaders surveyed feel they don’t have enough skills within their organisation to guide the firm through a potential cyber-attack.

A possible explanation for this feeling of unpreparedness and a shortfall in budget is that 40% of respondents said protection against potential cyber breaches isn’t a number one priority for their company.

This is despite the fact that 32% of businesses experienced a cyber breach or attack in the last 14 months, with the statistics being much higher for medium businesses (59%) and large businesses (69%), according to the UK Government’s Cyber security breaches survey 2023.

On the data that Auxilion’s survey produced, Philip Maguire, the company’s CEO, said: “Despite the warnings and widespread news coverage of cyber breaches, it is quite alarming to see leaders feeling like they don’t have the adequate budget, buy-in or expertise required to protect against threats.

“There’s no doubt about it – cybersecurity should be one of – if not the number one – priority for business leaders. The damage that can be caused from a reputational and financial standpoint means this should be taken far more seriously at leadership level.”

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So that businesses can effectively protect themselves amid the ever-changing cyber threat landscape, an appropriate security budget that affords cybersecurity teams to monitor, thwart, and respond to threats is needed.

Earlier this year, DIGIT reported on findings that suggest Chief Information Security Officers (CISOs) see budget as the biggest barrier to strategy execution in 2023.

Specifically, 51% of the respondents of tech recruitment firm Stott and May’s Cyber Security in Focus report cited budget as the primary inhibiting factor to delivering on strategy, which has overtaken the other issue of internal skills (34%).

Further, 44% of respondents said their cybersecurity budget will stay the same or decrease, and that, as a result, strategic investment has little for experimentation, thereby potentially limiting cyber preparedness and response as continuing threats push on and new threats emerge.