Google’s 2026 Cybersecurity Forecast: Data Security, Privacy, and Compliance

The cybersecurity landscape is undergoing a fundamental transformation. Google’s Cybersecurity Forecast 2026 Report, released in November 2025, delivers a sobering assessment of what organizations face in the coming year—and the findings should command the attention of every security leader, compliance officer, and data privacy professional.

Key Takeaways

1. AI Has Become a Standard Weapon for Cyber Attackers. Threat actors now use artificial intelligence to accelerate every phase of their operations, from social engineering to malware development. Google warns that prompt injection attacks will scale from isolated incidents to large-scale data exfiltration campaigns.
2. Shadow AI Poses an Immediate Compliance Risk. Employees are adopting unsanctioned AI tools at alarming rates, creating invisible data pipelines that bypass security controls. Banning these tools is counterproductive. Organizations need governance frameworks that provide approved alternatives while maintaining visibility.
3. Ransomware and Data Extortion Remain the Top Financial Threat. The combination of ransomware, data theft, and multifaceted extortion continues as the most financially disruptive category of cybercrime globally. Q1 2025 set a record with over 2,300 victims listed on data leak sites, demonstrating the resilience of criminal ecosystems.
4. Virtualization Infrastructure Is an Emerging Blind Spot. Hypervisors have become high-value targets because many organizations lack endpoint detection visibility into these systems. A single hypervisor compromise can enable mass encryption of virtual machine disks and disrupt entire environments within hours.
5. AI Agents Require New Identity Management Approaches. Organizations deploying AI agents for workflow automation must treat these systems as distinct identities with their own access controls. Google’s forecast introduces “agentic identity management” with adaptive, just-in-time access and granular least-privilege controls.

This analysis examines the report’s most significant findings across three critical domains: data security, data privacy, and regulatory compliance. While grounded in Google’s forecast, this piece also incorporates supporting data from OWASP, Gartner, and other 2025 threat intelligence research to illustrate how these trends are materializing in practice.

AI Arms Race: Attackers Have Fully Embraced Artificial Intelligence

The era of experimentation is over. Threat actors have moved beyond testing AI capabilities and now deploy these technologies as standard operational tools across the entire attack life cycle.

Google’s research indicates that adversaries are leveraging AI to enhance the speed, scope, and effectiveness of their operations. This includes social engineering campaigns, information operations, and malware attacks. The implications for data security are profound: Attacks that once required weeks of preparation can now be executed in hours.

One vulnerability stands out as particularly concerning. The forecast warns that prompt injection attacks—where malicious actors manipulate AI systems by feeding them hidden instructions—will scale from proofs-of-concept to large-scale data exfiltration and sabotage campaigns as more organizations embed AI into daily operations. OWASP’s 2025 Top 10 for LLM Applications and Generative AI ranks prompt injection as the number one risk, and some security audits report these vulnerabilities present in over 73% of production AI deployments.

The mechanics are deceptively simple. An attacker crafts input that causes an AI system to ignore its original instructions and execute unauthorized commands instead. The consequences can range from data exfiltration to privilege escalation to the manipulation of business processes.

Google’s recommended defense strategy employs multiple layers: model hardening, machine learning content classifiers to filter malicious instructions from untrusted data, “security thought reinforcement” to keep models aligned with user intent, strict output sanitization, and user confirmation requirements for high-risk actions. Organizations deploying AI systems without these protections are operating with significant exposure.

Shadow AI: The Data Leak You Cannot See

A parallel threat is emerging from within organizations themselves. Employees across every department are turning to unsanctioned AI tools to boost productivity and automate tasks. Google’s forecast warns that by 2026, these “Shadow Agents”—employee-created or adopted AI tools operating without IT oversight—will create uncontrolled pipelines for sensitive data, increasing risks of data leaks, IP theft, and compliance violations.

The report is clear that banning these tools is not the answer. Prohibition simply drives AI usage off-network and out of sight, eliminating any possibility of governance or monitoring.

Recent industry research quantifies the scale of this challenge. An UpGuard shadow AI study found that more than 80% of workers—and nearly 90% of security professionals—use unapproved AI tools in their jobs. Half of workers report using these tools regularly, and fewer than 20% use only company-approved AI solutions. LayerX research reports that 77% of employees paste data into generative AI prompts, with 82% of those interactions occurring via unmanaged accounts outside any enterprise oversight.

The compliance implications are severe. Gartner predicts that by 2030, more than 40% of global organizations will suffer security and compliance incidents due to unauthorized AI tool usage. Intellectual property exposure, regulatory penalties under frameworks like GDPR and HIPAA, and loss of customer trust represent tangible risks that extend well beyond the IT department.

Google’s forecast argues for a new discipline of AI data governance that embeds protection from the start. Secure-by-design approaches, central controls that route and monitor AI agent traffic, and clear audit trails are essential for demonstrating control to regulators and auditors.

Ransomware and Data Theft: The Financially Disruptive Threat Continues

Ransomware attacks combined with data-theft extortion remains the most financially damaging category of cybercrime globally. Google’s forecast states explicitly that this threat will persist through 2026, with cascading impacts on suppliers, customers, and communities.

The numbers from early 2025 confirm that this threat is intensifying. Google’s report cites 2,302 victims listed on data leak sites in Q1 2025—the highest single-quarter count since tracking began in 2020. Other threat intelligence sources, including Optiv’s Q1 2025 analysis, put the count slightly higher at 2,314 victims and calculate a 213% year-on-year increase compared to Q1 2024.

The ecosystem supporting these attacks has become remarkably resilient. Check Point’s Q3 2025 State of Ransomware report tracked more than 85 active data leak sites and observed approximately 520-540 new ransomware victims per month—roughly double the rate seen in early 2024. When major ransomware-as-a-service platforms are disrupted by law enforcement, affiliate operators simply migrate to alternative programs or establish their own leak sites, resulting in only short-term interruption to overall activity levels.

What has changed is the method of attack. Google’s forecast highlights that threat actors increasingly exploit zero-day vulnerabilities and target managed file transfer software to conduct high-volume data exfiltration across hundreds of targets simultaneously. A single compromised file transfer platform can enable access to vast quantities of sensitive data from multiple organizations in a single campaign.

Ransomware operators also continue using voice phishing and other targeted social engineering tactics to bypass multi-factor authentication and gain access to data-rich environments.

Privacy Dimension: Personal Data Under Siege

While Google’s report focuses primarily on security and geopolitics, the privacy implications are impossible to ignore. Several trends directly affect personal and sensitive data in ways that extend the harm well beyond the initially targeted organizations.

AI-enabled social engineering represents an escalating threat to personal information. Google’s forecast describes how threat actors are using AI-driven voice cloning to impersonate executives or IT staff, enabling convincing vishing campaigns that trick people into disclosing credentials or authorizing fraudulent actions.

When ransomware operators publish stolen data on leak sites, the privacy impact cascades. The thousands of victims listed on these sites each quarter represent not just organizational breaches but exposures of personal information affecting countless individuals. Medical records, financial data, employment information, and other sensitive categories flow through these criminal channels with regularity.

The emergence of on-chain crime introduces another dimension. As organizations adopt cryptocurrency and tokenized assets, Google’s forecast warns that adversaries will exploit blockchain immutability and decentralization for financial gain and data exfiltration. The permanent nature of blockchain records means that data-related financial activity becomes irreversible and traceable indefinitely—a double-edged sword for both attackers and defenders.

Nation-state operations add yet another layer of privacy concern. The forecast describes Iranian actors and others engaged in monitoring regime critics and politically relevant individuals, while influence campaigns leverage AI-generated content and inauthentic personas. These activities depend on collecting and exploiting personal and behavioral data at scale.

Compliance and Governance: The New Imperatives

The Google forecast makes clear that existing security and compliance frameworks are inadequate for the AI-enabled threat environment. Organizations must adapt their governance models to address risks that did not exist when current regulations and standards were developed.

The shadow AI discussion explicitly identifies compliance violations as a direct consequence of uncontrolled AI agents processing sensitive data. When employees feed customer information, health records, or financial data into unsanctioned AI tools, they may be violating GDPR, HIPAA, PCI DSS, or sector-specific requirements without any visibility into the exposure.

The report argues for a new discipline of AI data governance that embeds protection from the start. Secure-by-design approaches, central controls that route and monitor AI agent traffic, and clear audit trails are essential for demonstrating control to regulators and auditors.

The emerging concept of agentic identity management offers a blueprint for maintaining access-control compliance as AI systems become more autonomous. Google’s forecast anticipates treating AI agents as distinct identities with managed permissions, adaptive just-in-time access, granular least-privilege controls, and clear chains of delegation. This approach aligns with established identity and access management principles while addressing the unique characteristics of AI-driven workflows.

For industrial control systems and operational technology environments, the prescribed controls map directly to regulatory expectations. Network segmentation between IT and OT, strong multi-factor authentication, least-privilege access for remote connections, immutable offline backups of industrial configurations and critical enterprise data, and network monitoring on IT/OT paths all represent established best practices that take on renewed urgency given the threat actors’ continued focus on critical infrastructure.

Infrastructure Blind Spots: Virtualization and Operational Technology

Two infrastructure categories receive particular attention in the forecast as emerging blind spots in enterprise security.

Virtualization platforms—hypervisors and the infrastructure supporting virtual machines—have become prime targets precisely because they are often overlooked. Google’s forecast warns that a single hypervisor compromise can enable mass encryption of virtual machine disks and rapidly disrupt entire environments hosting critical data and applications. Many organizations lack endpoint detection and response visibility into these systems, and the software is frequently outdated with insecure default configurations.

For industrial control systems and operational technology, the forecast states that the primary disruptive threat will remain cybercrime rather than nation-state sabotage. Ransomware that targets critical enterprise software such as ERP systems can disrupt the data flows essential for OT operations, even without directly compromising industrial systems.

The recommended mitigations for both categories emphasize fundamentals: network segmentation, strong authentication, least-privilege access, immutable backups, and continuous monitoring. These are not novel concepts, but their application to virtualization infrastructure and IT/OT convergence points requires renewed attention.

Nation-State Threat to Sensitive Data

Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea will continue long-term campaigns aimed at strategic intelligence, critical infrastructure access, and economic advantage. For organizations holding valuable intellectual property or operating in sensitive sectors, these adversaries represent persistent threats.

Google’s forecast describes Russia shifting from purely Ukraine-focused operations toward broader long-term strategic goals while retaining cyber-espionage targeting Ukraine and its allies.

China-nexus actors are expected to maintain very high-volume operations with a focus on edge devices, zero-day exploitation, and attacks on third-party providers. The semiconductor sector receives particular attention, driven partly by AI-related demand and export controls, where theft of sensitive intellectual property remains strategically valuable.

Iranian operations span multiple purposes: espionage, disruption, hacktivism-like activity, and financial motives, plus AI-assisted information operations and monitoring of regime critics.

North Korea continues to focus on revenue generation and espionage, with high-value attacks on cryptocurrency organizations representing a significant funding source for the regime.

Preparing for 2026: Strategic Recommendations

The findings in Google’s Cybersecurity Forecast 2026 demand strategic response across multiple dimensions.

Organizations must treat AI as both a defensive asset and a potential attack vector. The security operations center of the future—what Google terms the “Agentic SOC”—will leverage AI for threat detection, incident response correlation, and response automation. AI will generate case summaries, decode commands, and map activity to frameworks like MITRE ATT&CK, allowing analysts to focus on validation and faster containment. But realizing these benefits requires addressing the risks that AI systems themselves introduce.

Governance frameworks must evolve to address shadow AI before it creates unmanageable exposure. This means providing approved AI alternatives that meet user needs, implementing monitoring to detect unsanctioned usage, and establishing clear policies that enable innovation while maintaining security and compliance.

Ransomware preparedness remains essential. The record victim counts in early 2025 underscore that this threat is not abating. Immutable backups, incident response planning, and supply chain risk management—particularly around managed file transfer systems—are baseline requirements.

Privacy and compliance programs must extend to AI-related risks. The data compliance obligations that apply to traditional systems apply equally to AI tools, but the mechanisms for enforcement must adapt to the unique characteristics of these technologies.

Finally, organizations must invest in visibility. The threats identified in Google’s forecast succeed in part because they exploit blind spots—shadow AI that IT cannot see, virtualization infrastructure without adequate monitoring, AI systems vulnerable to prompt injection. Closing these visibility gaps is a precondition for effective defense.

Fundamentally Different Threat Landscape

Google’s Cybersecurity Forecast 2026 describes a threat landscape that has fundamentally changed. Artificial intelligence has become a force multiplier for adversaries even as it offers new defensive capabilities. Criminal ecosystems have achieved a level of resilience that makes them largely impervious to law enforcement disruption. Nation-state actors continue to pursue long-term strategic objectives through persistent cyber operations.

For data security, data privacy, and compliance professionals, the message is clear: The frameworks, controls, and governance models that served in the past are insufficient for the challenges ahead. Organizations that adapt proactively will be better positioned to protect their data, maintain regulatory compliance, and preserve stakeholder trust. Those that do not will find themselves increasingly vulnerable to threats that are growing in sophistication, scale, and impact.

The window for preparation is narrowing. The trends identified in this forecast are not future possibilities—they are present realities that are accelerating. The time to act is now.