AI-driven threats prompt IT leaders to rethink hybrid cloud security

New research indicates that the rise of artificial intelligence is forcing the majority of Security and IT leaders to reconsider their approach to managing hybrid cloud risks.

The Gigamon 2025 Hybrid Cloud Security Survey, conducted across Australia, France, Germany, Singapore, the UK, and the US, has found that 91 percent of Security and IT leaders are recalibrating their understanding of hybrid cloud risk due to the increasing impact of AI technologies.

The survey, which gathered responses from over 1,000 professionals, shows that cyberthreats are growing both in volume and sophistication. In Australia, breach rates have risen sharply, reaching 53 percent in the past year—a 17 percent year-on-year increase—with attacks generated by AI identified as a significant cause of this surge.

Security and IT teams are under significant pressure as global cybercrime is now estimated to cost USD $3 trillion annually, according to figures from the World Economic Forum. Many organisations are grappling with challenges including inefficient security tools, fragmented cloud environments, and insufficient threat intelligence, while adversaries using AI become more agile.

The report's findings highlight the extent to which AI is reshaping security priorities for hybrid cloud infrastructure. Managing threats originating from AI is now the leading security concern for 46 percent of Security and IT leaders. A third of those surveyed noted that network data volumes have doubled over the past two years, attributing this increase to AI-related workloads.

In Australia, 56 percent of respondents have observed growth in attacks directed at their large language model (LLM) deployments. Furthermore, 58 percent have experienced a noticeable increase in AI-powered ransomware attacks, up from 41 percent in 2024, highlighting a trend where attackers exploit AI to overcome existing cyber defences.

Most Security and IT leaders acknowledge they must make compromises in securing and managing hybrid cloud infrastructure. In Australia, this figure rises to 94 percent. The principal reasons cited for these compromises are the lack of clean, high-quality data needed for secure AI workload deployment (46 percent), and insufficient oversight across their digital environments, including the ability to monitor lateral movement in East-West network traffic (47 percent).

Public cloud security risks are also undergoing renewed assessment. While the public cloud was widely adopted during the post-pandemic shift to digital operations, it is increasingly seen as a source of risk. According to the survey, 70 percent of Security and IT leaders now see the public cloud as a greater risk than any other environment. As a result, an equivalent proportion are actively considering moving data back from public to private cloud due to security concerns, and 54 percent are reluctant to use AI solutions in the public cloud citing apprehensions about intellectual property protection.

The need for improved visibility is emphasised in the findings. Rising sophistication in cyberattacks has exposed the limitations of existing security tools—more than half (55 percent) of Security and IT leaders reported lacking confidence in their current toolsets' ability to detect breaches, mainly due to insufficient visibility. Accordingly, 64 percent say their primary objective for the next year is to achieve real-time threat monitoring through comprehensive real-time visibility into all data in motion.

David Land, Vice President, APAC at Gigamon, commented: "Security teams are struggling to keep pace with the speed of AI adoption and the growing complexity of and vulnerability of public cloud environments. Deep observability addresses this challenge by combining MELT data with network-derived telemetry such as packets, flows, and metadata, delivering increased visibility and a more informed view of risk. It enables teams to close visibility gaps, regain control, and act proactively with increased confidence. With 87 percent of Security and IT leaders in Australia agreeing it is critical to securing AI deployments, deep observability is fast becoming a strategic imperative."

Nearly nine in ten (89 percent) Security and IT leaders globally now regard deep observability as essential for securing and managing hybrid cloud infrastructure. The survey also notes that board members are increasingly engaged with these issues, with 83 percent of Australian respondents indicating that deep observability is being addressed at the boardroom level in response to the evolving threat to hybrid cloud environments.

The research was carried out in collaboration with Vitreous World and is based on responses gathered from 1,021 participants during February and March 2025.