The bottom line: Data breaches involving AI increased 56 percent year-over-year; attackers primarily use deepfakes and AI-generated malware.
IBM’s “Cost of a Data Breach Report” documents a 56 percent increase: In more than one in four data breaches worldwide in 2024, AI deployment played a role. CISOs must prepare for new attack vectors.
IBM’s “Cost of a Data Breach Report” shows that AI technologies were used in over 25 percent of all documented data breaches worldwide. Compared to the previous year, this represents a 56 percent increase – a clear signal of the acceleration of these attack tactics.
The primary attack vectors are identity theft through deepfakes and AI-generated malware. Both methods enable attackers to scale social engineering campaigns and more effectively compromise authentication systems. Deepfakes allow attackers to abuse trust and gain access credentials; AI-powered malware adapts to detection systems, making detection more difficult.
For CISOs, this trend means extending classical defense measures to include AI-specific risk models. This concerns both advanced authentication procedures against identity theft and the ability to analyze and block AI-generated malware variants in real time.
Source: itwelt.at · Published 30 July 2026
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