Security Teams Stretched Thin as AI Reshapes Roles and Widens the Skills Gap

Security teams are under growing strain. Barracuda's Cybersecurity Skills Gap report surveyed 2,000 IT and security decision-makers, and 67% said their teams are under pressure and struggling to scale to meet evolving business needs. Half said their security professionals are expected to support growing digital operations without extra resources. The most common skills gaps relate to AI-related risks (68%) and advanced identity and phishing threats (67%), including business email compromise, OAuth abuse and multi-factor authentication bypass.

AI is also changing team make-up. More than 56% of respondents reported a reduction in security head count linked to AI, split evenly between entry-level and more senior roles. As AI takes on more routine analysis and response work, human roles are shifting toward threat investigation, incident leadership, automation governance and business risk management. Barracuda's Siroui Mushegian said organisations need to combine AI and automation with human expertise, judgment and visibility.

A forthcoming Security Priorities report from CSO's parent company, Foundry, points to the same pressure. Security chiefs said their teams most need to build skills in cloud security (35%), securing agentic AI technology (34%) and securing AI and machine learning-enabled technology (30%). The hardest roles to fill were cloud security architects, AI security specialists and forensics analysts.