Survey of 274 Senior Enterprise Risk Executives Reveals Top Five Emerging Risks in the Second Quarter of 2024
“Similar to AI-enhanced malicious attacks, soft ransomware targets require minimal experience and cost to cause significant financial and reputational damage,” said Gamika Takkar, director, research in the Gartner Risk & Audit Practice.
During the second quarter of 2024, Gartner surveyed 274 senior risk executives and managers to document and compare emerging risks, which are those that hold higher uncertainty because their evolution is rapid, nonlinear, or both.
Three of the top five most cited emerging risks are in the technology category (see Table 1) and new concern regarding soft ransomware targets enter the tracker for the first time. Escalating political polarization, which first entered the tracker in 4Q23, held steady as the third most cited concern, while misaligned organizational talent profile moved up from the fifth to fourth most cited risk.
Causes of Soft Ransomware Targets
“Ransomware-as-a-service lowers the barrier to entry for inexperienced cybercriminals who know just enough about how to attack and disrupt business operations, creating worse impacts than usual when attacks occur,” said Takkar.
Potential Consequences to Mitigate
“While operational disruption and increased costs are dire consequences of soft ransomware targets, the exposure to extortion can impact not just the organization itself, but any and all associated third-parties as well, further underscoring the importance of understanding and preventing such risk,” said Takkar.
