The $10 Million Question: Why Are 81% of Organizations Still Getting Breached?

We are living in a security paradox. Cybersecurity budgets are increasing, security stacks are growing more complex, and yet, the needle barely seems to move. According to the newly drafted 2026 Cyberthreat Defense Report (CDR), 81% of organizations experienced at least one successful cyberattack this past year. Even more concerning, the number of organizations suffering from six or more successful attacks is actually creeping up.

If we are spending more and deploying more tools, why are threat actors still getting through?

The answer lies in a widening gap between how fast we build software and how effectively we secure it—a gap that is now being exploited by AI-powered threats.

The AppSec Implementation Gap

Securing the software supply chain remains a massive hurdle for most enterprises. In the 2026 CDR, security professionals rated “Application development and testing (SDLC, DevSecOps)” among the most difficult IT functions to perform, scoring it a daunting 4.10 out of 5.

The data reveals a stark reality: while everyone talks about “shifting left,” execution is lagging. Only 42.2% of organizations have fully implemented secure coding and code review practices. That leaves a nearly 58% implementation gap where vulnerabilities can slip into production. When developers are pressured to release code faster to drive business innovation, security is too often viewed as a bottleneck rather than an enabler.

The AI Threat Multiplier

While organizations struggle to embed security into their development lifecycles, threat actors are weaponizing artificial intelligence to bypass traditional defenses.

According to the report, AI-enabled evasive malware is the number one AI-related threat concern, cited by 45.5% of security professionals. This isn’t your standard malicious payload. Adaptive, AI-enabled malware learns from a target organization’s environment in real-time, creating new strategies on the fly to avoid being recognized as malicious. It uses techniques like fileless execution and delayed activation to completely fool conventional anti-malware tools.

When you combine a 58% gap in secure coding practices with malware that can dynamically rewrite itself to evade detection, an 81% breach rate suddenly makes perfect sense.

Working Smarter, Not Harder

The traditional approach of bolting security on at the end of the development cycle or relying solely on perimeter defenses is failing. You cannot fight AI-speed threats with human-speed remediation. The answer isn’t working harder; it’s working smarter.

To break the cycle, organizations must:

• Embed security natively into the SDLC: Make secure coding the path of least resistance for developers so that security becomes a seamless part of the workflow, not a roadblock.
• Fight AI with AI: Leverage AI-powered automation to identify, prioritize, and remediate critical risks in code before they are ever deployed.
• Focus on developer enablement: Upskill engineering teams with the tools they need to write secure code from day one, reducing the friction between security and development.

Join the Conversation: Defending Against AI-Powered Attacks

How do you close the AppSec gap and defend against adaptive threats without putting the brakes on your engineering teams?

Join Veracode’s CISO, Sohail Iqbal, and the experts at CyberEdge for our webinar: Defending Against AI-Powered Attacks Without Slowing Down Innovation.

Backed by data from 1,200 IT security professionals across 17 countries, this session will dive deep into the findings of the 2026 Cyberthreat Defense Report. We’ll cover:

• Why traditional defenses fail against AI-powered evasive malware.
• How leading organizations embed security into development without slowing teams down.
• Practical, data-backed strategies to close the 58% AppSec implementation gap.

Want to dive into the data yourself? Download the full 2026 Cyberthreat Defense Report to benchmark your organization’s security posture against your peers.