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How CISOs Will Navigate 2026’s Evolving Threat Landscape, ETCIO
As businesses rush to harness AI, integrate data across multiple clouds, and collaborate across borders, they must also navigate a rapidly evolving security landscape marked by rising threats, stricter regulations, and increasing complexity. In 2026, Indian enterprises are expected to increase their IT spending to $176.3 billion, a 10.6% rise from 2025, driven by investments in AI, data centers, and modern IT infrastructure. Against this backdrop, it will be imperative for CISOs and enterprise security leaders to navigate the rise of AI-powered threats, including agentic cybercrime and AI-generated misinformation, while leveraging advanced AI tools to close persistent talent shortages and strengthen defensive capabilities.1. Cyber Agents Will Become Weapons in the Next Wave of Cybercrime.
By 2026, agentic cybercrime will become a frontline problem with defenders facing a new class of adversary. One of the biggest risks with AI agents will be prompt injection — adversaries tricking systems into bypassing guardrails — and hallucinations that generate false or misleading outputs. We can expect to see agents that will look at code, find a vulnerability, and custom-build exploit kits to exfiltrate data and deploy ransomware. We’ll also see cases of AI creating sales documents or security claims that don’t exist, putting companies at risk of legal penalties. But this is only the beginning. The real inflection point will come when agents stop simply imitating attackers and begin creating entirely new strategies — and that’s when defenders will be facing a whole new level of trouble.2. Cybercriminals Will Harness Dark AI to Scale Attacks.
While today’s foundational models are built with guardrails, malicious actors are already deploying uncensored versions like FraudGPT and WormGPT to generate phishing campaigns, malicious code, and social engineering attacks. In many ways, this is the dark side of open source, with malicious actors taking open source models like GPT-J-6B and deploying them without the ethical guardrails of commercial systems. AI-enhanced tools will rapidly become part of the supply chain fueling cybercrime-as-a-service. This underground economy will no longer rely on individual attackers, but on global businesses that package and sell the infrastructure of cybercrime — complete with subscription tiers, customer support, and regular updates. As these offerings mature, even the most advanced and expensive AI models will inevitably be weaponized. 3. AI Tools Will Close Cybersecurity’s Long-Standing Talent Shortage
For all the risks AI introduces, it also carries real promise for defenders. Generative and agentic AI will start to give security operations centers the scale they’ve been missing. The most persistent problem for CISOs has been the shortage of skilled analysts. Security talent is hard to find and hard to retain. Instead of replacing human expertise, advanced AI will fill the security roles that have gone unstaffed for years, augmenting analysts and evening the playing. Within the next three years, AI agents will provide the force multiplier needed to finally tip the balance back toward defenders.
The author is Brad Jones, Chief Information Security Officer, Snowflake
Disclaimer: The views expressed are solely of the author and ETCISO does not necessarily subscribe to it. ETCISO shall not be responsible for any damage caused to any person/organization directly or indirectly.
