Both American and British business leaders view artificial intelligence-driven attacks as the greatest emerging cyber threat to organisations, but according to a new report from Axis Capital, that is largely where similarities end.

An Axis survey of 500 chief executives and chief information security officers found that British leaders were more cautious than their American counterparts, with 85 per cent of US respondents feeling prepared for AI threats compared with 44 per cent of British leaders.

AI was generally viewed positively on both sides of the Atlantic but confidence in cybersecurity and preparedness differed.

While 88.4 per cent of US CEOs were confident AI would better their company’s safeguards, the figure was 55 per cent in Britain.

The survey showed that AI is transforming the risk landscape, Axis said.

The firm’s president and CEO, Vince Tizzio, said the findings underscored a new environment where a technology promising untold productivity gains is also creating unprecedented risk.

“AI is clearly a transformative force for data analytics, innovation and operational efficiency,” he said. “It is also undeniable that AI is quickly propelling us towards an entirely new risk landscape.”

The research suggested AI-driven threats — from shadow AI, model manipulation and deepfakes/social engineering to data leakage and advanced ransomware attacks — are often faster, more adaptive and harder to detect.

There were also generational divides.

Only 23.1 per cent of executives aged 55 and older told Axis they believed AI would improve their company’s cyber defences, compared with 77.4 per cent of leaders aged 35 to 44.

Nearly 82 per cent of respondents planned to increase their cybersecurity budgets over the next 12 months.

Three quarters of respondents, 75.2 per cent, were likely to reduce cybersecurity headcount because of greater productivity resulting from investment in AI cybersecurity tools.

While survey participants across both regions believed AI delivered return on investment for cybersecurity, Americans were more enthusiastic, with 93.5 per cent of CEOs and 87.5 per cent of chief information security officers believing AI delivered return on investment.

“Our survey findings indicate the impact of AI in transforming corporate defence strategies while exposing differing views between CEOs’ strategic optimism and CISOs’ security prudence,” Axis head of global cyber and technology Lori Bailey said.

Ms Bailey added that while it is common for CEOs to champion AI as a catalyst for innovation and efficiency, CISOs tend to see it as a new frontier of exposure and control.

• For the full report see Related Media

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