IDC: Worldwide Security Spending to Increase as Global Cyberthreats Rise

Global security spending is expected to grow by 12.2% year on year in 2025, according to IDC. The market research organization says increasing complexity and frequency of cyberthreats — accelerated by generative AI (GenAI) and AI in general — are driving organizations worldwide to adopt more advanced defensive measures. As a result, security spending is expected to see sustained growth throughout the 2023–2028 forecast period, reaching $377 billion in 2028.

The United States and Western Europe will continue to account for more than 70% of global security spending in 2025, according to IDC. However, all geographic regions are expected to see consistent growth in security spending this year, with the highest increases in Latin America, Central & Eastern Europe, and the Middle East & Africa.

“Growing digital transformation and hiking emerging technology adoption across the Middle East & Africa (MEA) region — especially countries in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) — have pushed the demand significantly for security solutions to face the evolving threat landscapes,” said Eman Elshewy, senior research manager with IDC Data and Analytics. “MEA is witnessing substantial investments from both government and enterprises to fight rising cyber threats, with strong awareness for the importance of cybersecurity education and training programs to fortify organizations against possible attacks.”

The report further states that security software will be the largest technology group in 2025, representing more than half of the worldwide security market this year, as well as the fastest growing one, with a 14.4% year-on-year growth rate. The security software market growth will be driven especially by cloud native application protection platform (CNAPP), identity and access management software, and security analytics software growth, reflecting the special focus that companies will put on integrated cyberthreats detection and response around their whole organizational perimeter.

Security services will be the second fastest growing technology group in 2025, driven by the continuous expansion of managed security services, on which organizations of all sizes will continue to increase their focus as a flexible and efficient way to face new security challenges. Finally, security hardware will rank third, achieving single-digit but steady growth in 2025.

Banking, federal/central government, telecommunications, capital markets, and healthcare provider will be the industries spending the most at the global level on security in 2025, while the fastest-growing will be capital markets, media and entertainment, and life sciences with an expected year-on-year growth rate of 19.4%, 17.1%, and 16.9%, respectively in 2025.

“The protection from cyber threats — now enhanced by AI and GenAI — is becoming an increasingly strategic issue for organizations in all industries, especially for those managing critical infrastructures (e.g., oil & gas, telecommunications), developing critical assets (e.g., aerospace & defense, life sciences), or providing key services to clients (e.g., banking, capital markets) and citizens (e.g., federal/central government, healthcare provider),” says Stefano Perini, research manager with IDC Data and Analytics. “Although national and international regulations still play an important role in guiding organizations’ security strategies — especially in regulated industries — more of them are realizing that having a proactive approach to security is crucial, not only as a short-term operational protection measure but also as a competitive advantage in the long term.”

Channel Impact^®
IDC’s Worldwide Security Spending Guide quantifies both core and next-generation security spending for 28 industries and five company sizes across 39 technology markets and 48 countries. The spending guides are delivered via pivot table format or custom query tool, enabling the user to easily extract information about each market by viewing data trends and relationships.