It looks likely that a significant period of growth in cybersecurity is on the way: Through 2027, half of chief information security officers will adopt human-centric design to reduce cybersecurity operational friction, according to Gartner Inc.

Meanwhile, the cybersecurity industry has become highly fragmented. It’s a market in which the leaders have low single-digit market shares. Perhaps it’s fitting, then, that this year’s RSA Conference has adopted the phrase “Stronger Together” as its theme. TheCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s livestreaming studio, will be covering the event from April 24 to 27 in San Francisco.

The conference’s goal of “tackling big problems together” also shaped this year’s lineup of speakers.

“It’s the premier event for the cybersecurity sector,” said theCUBE industry analyst Dave Vellante. “High-level, trend-wise, security remains the top priority for chief information officers and chief information security officers.”

Indeed, according to Enterprise Technology Research, cybersecurity is the top priority, ahead of other areas such as analytics and cloud migration. With that in mind, there will be plenty to discuss at this year’s RSA Conference. During the event, Vellante and theCUBE industry analyst John Furrier will talk with cybersecurity experts and industry executives about the latest trends and threats on the horizon.

Pushing back against threats

During last year’s RSA Conference, the theme that dominated much of the conversation was Russian troops beginning the invasion of Ukraine. Though some conversations centered around expected cyberattacks from Russia, other speakers discussed zero-day vulnerabilities and artificial intelligence.

One year later the war in Ukraine continues, and so does the conversation around cybersecurity in that context. In January, security company Armis Inc. found that organizations were underprepared to handle cyber warfare. And, more recently, big-data analytics company Splunk Inc. revealed that security leaders were seeing more cyberattacks and outages, with 52% of organizations saying they had suffered a data breach in the past two years, an increase from 49% in 2022 and 39% in 2021.

“In the organizations we’ve worked with, resilience has been strongest with a collaborative approach in everything, from software development and infrastructure monitoring to business continuity planning,” Ryan Kovar, distinguished security strategist for Splunk, said ahead of the report’s release. “This approach brings everyone to the table, including security leaders with IT and business leaders, so they all can focus on protecting the organization.”

It’s that approach ― bringing together the collective to stand against cyber threats ― that organizers at RSA Conference believe will make a difference in pushing back against increased threats around the globe. RSA Conference is largely considered the premier cybersecurity trade show, having run for more than 30 years with around 45,000 people attending each year. 

A broad range of perspective

RSA Security LLC, with which RSA Conference shares its namesake, maintains a strong presence in the cybersecurity market, particularly for its RSA SecurID authentication token. The company is seen as a big player in the space, but it has had plenty of competition, including from McAfee Corp. and Palo Alto Networks, as the market has grown to ward off some serious threats. According to McKinsey & Co., damage from cyberattacks are projected to amount to about $10.5 trillion annually by 2025.

It’s also a highly fragmented sector, Vellante noted. From a market share standpoint, cybersecurity is even more fragmented than the software market, he revealed in a recent Breaking Analysis. That means that there is a lot more room for companies to grow.

“Top players such as Palo Alto Networks have low-digit market shares; they’re highly fragmented. The market has evolved. The tendency has been to adopt the latest innovations, such as network, endpoint, cloud and edge security,” Vellante said, noting that funding companies emerge to solve specific problems with best-of-breed solutions. “So the fragmentation continues to be a problem.”

During the event, theCUBE will analyze all the latest trends emerging in the space, including the challenges facing the industry, such as talent shortages. There was a shortage of 3.4 million cybersecurity workers needed to secure assets effectively, according to a study released by the nonprofit International Information System Security Certification Consortium in late 2022.

TheCUBE will analyze and talk with guests about the latest trends in the space, including the latest in artificial intelligence, the rise of ransomware, and an increase of women working in the space, among other interesting developments.

The conference itself bills itself as an opportunity for attendees to dive deep into the latest trends while listening to unique perspectives and real-life stories. Those insights are all the more critical, especially in a world juggling geopolitical challenges and new advancements in artificial intelligence.

“The challenges for cybersecurity professionals are dead simple to understand. Solving them is not so easy,” according to Vellante in a recent SiliconANGLE Breaking Analysis.

TheCUBE will be on-site at this year’s RSA Conference to capture all of the breaking news and real-time analysis. You can follow theCUBE’s wall-to-wall coverage for firsthand insights.

TheCUBE event livestream

Don’t miss theCUBE’s coverage of this year’s RSA Conference on April 24-27. Plus, you can watch theCUBE’s event coverage on-demand after the live event.

How to watch theCUBE interviews

We offer you various ways to watch theCUBE’s coverage of this year’s RSA Conference, including theCUBE’s dedicated website and YouTube channel. You can also get all the coverage from this year’s events on SiliconANGLE.

TheCUBE Insights podcast

SiliconANGLE also has podcasts available of archived interview sessions, available on iTunes, Stitcher and Spotify, which you can enjoy while on the go.

SiliconANGLE also has analyst deep dives in our Breaking Analysis podcast, available on iTunes, Stitcher and Spotify.

Guests

Stay tuned for theCUBE’s full RSA Conference guest lineup here.

Image: SiliconANGLE