Nine In 10 Malaysian Businesses Not Fully Prepared For AI Cyber Threats -- Synology Inc
KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 21 (Bernama) -- Nearly nine in 10 businesses in Malaysia are not fully prepared for artificial intelligence (AI)-driven cyber threats, highlighting the need to strengthen data protection and recovery capabilities as companies adopt the technology, according to Synology Inc.
Its Malaysia country manager Jason Sin said businesses must balance the productivity benefits of AI with data security and their ability to restore operations following disruptions.
“The data showed that only 10.9 per cent of Malaysian businesses considered themselves very prepared to defend against and recover from AI-driven cyber threats.
“Businesses also need to find the right balance between AI and data security,” he said during the presentation of findings from Synology’s 2026 Southeast Asia Survey to the media here today.
On recovery readiness, Sin said the survey found that only 26.4 per cent of businesses were very confident they could recover operations quickly while keeping backup data protected from alteration, encryption or deletion.
“Businesses needed to ensure their backups remained usable when incidents occurred, as ransomware attackers could also target backup systems to prevent data restoration.
“Having a data backup is important, but businesses also need to ensure that their backups can be restored when disasters happen,” he said.
He said cybersecurity had become a business continuity issue, with attacks potentially disrupting production, hospital services and access to business data.
Meanwhile, nearly four in five businesses operated without a unified cybersecurity and data protection platform, according to the survey findings presented.
Sin said managing separate backup systems across multiple branches could increase administrative complexity and the risk of configuration errors.
“Centralised management could help information technology teams monitor backup operations across locations through a single interface.
“The survey also identified data security and privacy, data quality and availability, and scattered data as the leading AI adoption challenges in Malaysia,” he said.
On AI governance, Sin said the findings showed that only one in 10 businesses were fully confident they could produce a complete AI activity log, while more than 80 per cent did not actively enforce technical controls over employees’ AI use.
“Businesses needed visibility over the information employees shared with AI tools, particularly when sensitive company data was uploaded to external services.
“We urged companies to adopt AI according to practical business requirements while maintaining control over their information. Start with a clear business need, keep control of your data, and scale at your own pace,” he added.
Synology Inc is a Taiwanese corporation that specialises in network-attached storage appliances.
Also present at the event were the director of the international business department, Joanne Weng, and the head of Southeast Asia, Antoine Yang.
-- BERNAMA