A Customer Uses Their Phone To Pay Inside A Marks & Spencer Group Food Store In London, Uk, On Thursday, May 1, 2025. A Ransomware Attack Caused Disruption For The Retailer, With Hackers Using Malware To Lock Down Some Of Its Systems And Render Them Inaccessible. Credit: Chris Ratcliffe/bloomberg Via Getty Images.

Businesses remain overwhelmingly confident in the value of cybersecurity despite the recent high-profile cyberattacks on retailers, a survey has shown.

GlobalData’s Tech Sentiment Polls Q2 2025 survey, carried out across the company’s network of B2B news websites between April and June, found that 85% of respondents believe either that cybersecurity will live up to all of its promise or that there is some use for it. In terms of the impact the technology is expected to have, 69% of respondents suggested it would either significantly or at least slightly disrupt their industries.

Nearly two-thirds (60%) of respondents reported that cybersecurity is already disrupting their industries, with a further 18% believing that it will do so at some point in the next decade. The survey showed a slight fall in the proportion of respondents predicting that cybersecurity would not disrupt their industry at all, from 22% in Q1 2025 to 18% in Q2.

The survey was carried out around the time that various retailers in the UK and elsewhere were being hit by cyberattacks. They included Marks & Spencer, Co-op and Harrods.

By way of context, GlobalData said in its report outlining the survey results: “As a technology, cybersecurity is ubiquitous across all sectors. In Q2 2025, 68% of respondents believed cybersecurity was already disrupting their industry or would do so in the next 12 months. No industry is exempt from cyberattacks.

“A lower percentage of respondents claimed to fully understand cybersecurity this quarter (39%) than in the previous quarter (46%). As cyberattacks become more sophisticated, it will be more difficult to identify and tackle cybersecurity threats.”

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Elsewhere, the survey showed that artificial intelligence remains the technology that respondents believe will be most disruptive. Well over half (58%) believe it will significantly disrupt their industries, with a further fifth (19%) expecting a slight disruption.

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