June 16, 2016
Europe is emerging as a global leader in national cybersecurity enforcement. The European Union (EU) and countries connected to the Council of Europe and the European Economic Area, including Norway and Switzerland, have been most successful in implementing binding legal instruments in the area of cybercrime and cybersecurity. With impending EU legislation in place to mandate the protection of critical infrastructure, Europe will spend $35 billion in cybersecurity in this space by 2021, forecasts ABI Research.
The new Network and Information Security (NIS) Directive demands that critical infrastructure operators—including agriculture, energy, transport, pharmaceuticals, and even water and waste management—address cybersecurity, and will push them toward allocating budget to protect their infrastructure. Non-compliers will face significant financial repercussions.
“Europe remains a lucrative target, as it is a prosperous and highly-connected region,” says Michela Menting, Research Director at ABI Research. “The new directive will force operators to tackle cybersecurity issues in operational technologies, and notably in industrial settings, which is a huge step for many organizations.”