The Bottom Line: 75 percent of German companies have been hit by cyberattacks; while incident response processes are established, many lack continuous leadership engagement and preparation for AI-driven threats.
A ManageEngine study shows that 75 percent of German companies have been affected by cybersecurity incidents in the past twelve months. While basic incident response processes are in place, many organizations lack continuous engagement from executive leadership and preparedness for AI-driven threats.
The ManageEngine study surveyed 302 executives from IT, cybersecurity, and business leadership in Germany. The key finding: 75 percent of all companies were affected by at least one cybersecurity incident in the last twelve months. Phishing and social engineering remain the most dominant attack types, accounting for 56 percent of all reported incidents.
Operational readiness is a bright spot: 95 percent of companies conduct formal post-incident reviews following an incident, 95 percent have a formal backup strategy in place, and 92 percent have clearly defined responsibilities for incident response. However, one-third of security teams are working under constant stress or in crisis mode, compounded by staff shortages and manual processes.
For the coming twelve months, 45 percent of surveyed companies view AI-driven attacks as the greatest cybersecurity risk. This assessment aligns with findings from the United Kingdom and Spain. As a consequence, 35 percent of companies cite security measures against AI-based threats as their top investment priority for the next two years.
A critical gap emerges in corporate governance: 39 percent of respondents stated that boards and executive management focus intensively on cybersecurity primarily during crisis situations. Only 28 percent describe leadership engagement as continuous and very high. This suggests that for many organizations, cybersecurity is still viewed as an operational problem that comes into focus only when incidents occur, rather than as a strategic ongoing responsibility.
Source: www.it-daily.net · Published June 29, 2026
Lumi AI News — AI-assisted curation pursuant to Article 50 of the EU AI Act. Paraphrase and classification by Lumi News Pipeline v1.7.2.