Security will continue to be a key focus for IT managers - and tech resellers - next year, with Ovum predicting that the ever upward climb in security spend will continue next year, with an emphasis on helping businesses know more about the threats they face.

The analyst firm says global security spend will exceed US$37 billion next year, as security attacks, ranging from opportunistic hackers using pre-built tools to targeted, well-resourced and, on occasion, state-sponsored cyber activity, continues to threaten businesses worldwide.

Ovum's Security 2016 Trends to Watch report says the focus next year will be on helping organisations know more about the threats they face, with security intelligence and analytical capabilities used to map the threat landscape and find and take action against new and recurring threats.

It says 2016 will see more use being made of analytical and intelligence-based security tools to identify threats and help qualify the actions that need to be taken to keep businesses safe.

Ovum says the need for better security will also be driven by operational demands, as business information becomes more readily available – and consequently more vulnerable to cyberattacks – and increasing use of cloud-based services, user mobility and multiple devices adds complexity to security, particularly identity and access management requirements.

“Industry coverage will include new technologies which have been designed to identify and address the risky actions that users are taking and the unauthorised, often cloud-based facilities they are choosing to use,” Ovum says.

Andrew Kellett, Ovum principal analyst for software – IT solutions, says security plaudits should go to software and service providers who can identify threats earlier and provide organisations with the quality of security intelligence they need to keep data safe.

“More realistically, it is likely to go to vendors who can spot security breaches soon after they occur and deal effectively with the aftermath of remediation,” Kellett says.

He says detection and remediation tools that can spot all types of malware and reduce recovery timelines after a breach will continue to have an important role as cybercrime, state-sponsored activities and advanced persistent threats continue to hit home next year, while social engineering that targets human frailties will continue to put business systems at risk.

“The focus on keeping user and business data safe is a key issue,” Kellett says.

“As such there needs to be far more interest in the control elements of security that define what users are allowed to do: what on-premise and cloud-based facilities and services they can, and cannot, use, what data resources they are allowed to access and where that data can be kept.