Cyber attacks remain the biggest fear for energy and utilities firms but many companies may be dangerously overconfident about how resilient they really are.
New research from insurer Beazley found 29% of energy sector leaders now see cyber risk as the number one threat facing their business as digital systems, AI and connected supply chains, become increasingly exposed to disruption.
The survey covered 3,500 global business leaders including senior executives across the energy and utilities sector.
Despite the growing threat almost 80% of firms said they felt prepared for a cyber attack while 78% claimed they could recover financially from a major incident.
Beazley warned that confidence may not match reality.
The insurer said cyber threats are becoming more systemic with attacks now spreading rapidly across interconnected supply chains and critical infrastructure.
Technology disruption was highlighted by 23% of respondents while 24% pointed to ageing systems and technology obsolescence as a growing problem.
Another 23% said intellectual property risk was now a major concern as businesses digitise operations and deploy more AI-driven systems.
Around 30% of companies said they plan to increase spending on cyber security and resilience measures over the next year.
Alessandro Lezzi, Group Head of Cyber Risks at Beazley, said many businesses are “overestimating their preparedness to withstand the full impact of an attack”.
“That gap matters because cyber risk is becoming more systemic,” he said.
“As businesses become more interconnected and adopt technologies such as AI, disruption can spread faster across organisations and supply chains making incidents harder to contain.”
The findings come as energy firms face mounting pressure to modernise ageing infrastructure while also defending increasingly digitised operations from cyber threats.
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