Cybersecurity and Technology Predictions for 2026: What to Expect

I’ll start by saying Happy New Year! Along with the standard set of New Year’s resolutions, this time of year also brings an avalanche of annual predictions from every tech and cybersecurity company imaginable. You can guarantee that this year’s predictions will all have the same theme, AI.

Now, I don’t always share my own, personal, unsolicited, opinions, but what’s the fun in that? So, this year, I’m letting my inside voice be my outside voice. My musings (better left internal) will likely and hopefully turn into cringe worthy, eye rolling, misses. But this is something we can revisit and evaluate at the end of the year. Fingers crossed that none of what I predict here actually happens!

1. This will be a record breaking year for fraud, financial compromise, and theft. Deepfakes and other AI driven technologies are primed to take things to the next level. I predict the total financial loss in 2026 will double compared to previous years, which will also force cyber insurers to scramble and revamp their policies and coverages to ensure they don’t also suffer significant losses to AI. They’ll have to cover AI-based solutions (for protection) AND liabilities (when AI inevitably works against us). Similar to what the industry did with ransomware (their reaction to the fast growing issue and subsequent spikes in ransomware breaches and the cost for them to cover), we’ll start seeing AI usage, for and against, in our evaluation, and they will have a new, separate, coverage that we’ll be forced to pay for.

2. Speaking of financial disasters, I foresee a different kind of economic meltdown. Having seen firsthand what AI development is capable of, I look at the current landscape of cybersecurity companies and can’t help but predict that at least 50% of them are ripe for disruption (easily replicated or replaced via AI). They lack the protective “moats” or advanced AI innovation to withstand what’s coming. With AI enabling companies to take a DIY approach, there's a real chance businesses will start building their own tools rather than paying outside vendors. As revenue dries up for half the market, many of these companies will face significant losses, also extending to their shareholders. The result? A wave of market consolidation, with some companies doubling down on bad investments through mergers and acquisitions (re-capitalizing) to stay afloat or be sold for pennies on the dollar. Others will try to adopt AI quickly, transforming the business at breakneck pace, or try like hell to hold up to see if they can re-establish their value, hoping the AI hype train slows down enough to not leave them completely behind.

3. Back in 2017, I predicted we might see the internet go dark for a day. It sounded far fetched back then, but we did experience some significant DNS provider outages and large scale infrastructure vulnerabilities. Looking at how far AI has come, could this finally be the year? With AI, it’s no longer about just bots and organized hackers, it’s hyper scale coordination. Imagine highly trained AI systems launching continuous, adaptive attacks on the internet’s critical infrastructure. They’d analyze defenses, learn from countermeasures, and escalate their tactics, all in real time. As defenders, our options can be pretty limited. The ability and speed of AI greatly outpaces that of the well intended Defender, meaning it’s only a matter of time (seconds) before we succumb to compromise.

4. No respectable prediction post would be complete without having at least one prediction involving politics. AI has already demonstrated its power to spread misinformation; bots, fake accounts, AI-generated content, it’s all blurring the line between truth and fabricated nonsense. And it’s effective, scarily so. I’ve lost count of how many friends and family members confidently shared AI-generated videos or made statements or commented online as if they were gospel truth. The implications go beyond election interference, though. What happens when an AI-generated hoax sparks global mass panic? What if misinformation leads us to the brink of World War 3? Given the world’s current obsession with geopolitical conflict, it’s not out of the question. If that were to happen and escalate to conflict, imagine drones being operated by semi-autonomous or completely autonomous AI. I can already imagine the chaos if the machines start acting without a human supervisor. Will AI decide to fire the first bullet or will that be human? Will carefully crafted misinformation, powered by AI and the government, be used to escalate conflict or will we escalate because we fell victim to misinformation from other countries? Either way, it’s not great. Welcome Skynet!

5. Okay, let’s piggyback a bit off number 3. I predict we’ll see the first major outage of a leading AI provider. Think Google Gemini, OpenAI ChatGPT, Anthropic Claude, one of them hitting a breaking point. These platforms rely on an immense amount of power to run, and while they do an incredible job, they’re not invincible. Whether it’s a technical failure or a resource bottleneck, chances are something is going to give. And here’s another thought, will the cost (to consumers) of running these systems skyrocket? AI companies currently runs at a massive loss for most, and that can’t continue forever. Either they need to make their supply chains more efficient, or we consumers are going to feel the pinch. If prices climb too high, even the DIY AI models I mentioned earlier might start to lose their appeal (cheaper to have someone do it for you than to do it yourself). Will this be the year we start to see AI costs for consumers skyrocket or will they remain relatively low as the AI war for territorial dominance continues?

I know, this all sounds pretty dark, a little doom and gloom even. But look, I can’t help but enjoy a little glass half empty, a good murder mystery, the end of the world as we know it, every now and then. That said, I truly hope none of this comes to pass or at the very least, that we have some significant defenses in place to keep the worst of these possibilities at bay. There’s value, though, in contemplating the art of the possible. Denying the potential for these things doesn’t make them any less likely. So, here’s to hoping 2026 surprises us in ways that are a little more… uplifting. Good luck and godspeed to us all!