INTELLIGENT TECHNOLOGY

CYBERSECURITY

Rubrik, the security and AI operations company, has announced the Australian findings from the report, which show organisations are operationalising autonomous systems without the controls required to govern them, introducing a gap between innovation and security.

Based on a survey of more than 1,600 IT and security leaders, the report reveals:

• 88 % expect AI agents to outpace their organisation’ s security guardrails within the next year.

• Only 22 % report full visibility into the agents operating in their environments, which the report notes is likely an over-estimation on the part of respondents. The result is the inability to secure identities that are already making decisions, taking actions and interacting with critical data.

The gap is compounded by identity sprawl. Non-human identities tied to agents are proliferating faster than enterprises can track or govern them, forming what researchers describe as a‘ shadow workforce’. These identities often operate with persistent access and limited oversight, creating new pathways for misuse, compromise and lateral movement.

• Recovery and prevention are emerging as primary points of failure. Most( 96 %) leaders expressed concern about meeting recovery objectives as agentdriven threats increase.

The threat itself is accelerating. Almost half( 42 %) of Australian respondents expect agentic systems to drive the majority of attacks in the coming year, reflecting a broader shift in how adversaries operate. Autonomous systems compress timelines, scale attacks and blur the line between insider risk and external compromise.

“ AI adoption is outpacing our ability to control it. Enterprises are struggling because they’ ve deployed systems they can’ t fully observe, govern, or

Almost half( 42 %) of Australian respondents expect agentic systems to drive the majority of attacks in the coming year. restore,” said Kavitha Mariappan, Chief Transformation Officer at Rubrik.“ We have to move past the debate of whether AI is risky and address the harder reality: as decision-making shifts from human to machine, the critical challenge for every leader is maintaining operational safety in an increasingly autonomous landscape.”

For boards and executive teams, the implication is immediate. AI strategy is now inseparable from resilience strategy. Organisations that continue to prioritise deployment speed over control mechanisms risk creating environments where failures cannot be contained or reversed.

Rubrik Zero Labs’ report, The State of the Agent: Understanding Adoption, Risk, and Mitigation, combines global survey data with technical analysis of emerging attack vectors across the tool, cognitive and identity layers of AI systems. The research outlines a shift already underway: security is no longer about preventing breach alone, but about maintaining control in systems that no longer wait for human input. •

At the same time, the operational promise of AI agents is under strain. The report also found:

• 80 % of respondents report agents require more manual oversight than they save in efficiency. Every single Australian respondent( 100 %) said they lack the ability to roll back agent actions without system disruption.

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INTELLIGENT CIO APAC www. intelligentcio. com