Veeam Software is highlighting the findings of its latest Data Resilience survey of more than 4,000 C-Suite and senior IT leaders. The results spotlight a pivotal challenge: in an era where data and AI drive business success, organisations are more vulnerable than ever to data loss and outages. Organisations can only realise the promise of AI when data is resilient, secure, and governed, yet most boards and executives are unprepared for growing AI-driven risks.
The annual World Backup Day on March 31 serves as a critical reminder: regular, reliable backups are the cornerstone of digital trust and business continuity. Veeam’s research shows that executive concern over data outages now outweighs fears of economic recession, underscoring why backup and recovery planning must be top priorities for every organisation.
Ransomware and cyberattacks top the list of threats identified by business leaders, with 67% citing it as risks they dread most in the year ahead. AI-related risks – including data leaks, algorithm bias and uncontrolled automation – rank behind at 29%, signalling that emerging AI-driven threats are already a mainstream boardroom concern. These top three threats pose a high risk of data loss and outages. And while nearly half of organisations (47%) expect a significant data breach or cyberattack, only 32% believe full recovery of critical data and business operations is very likely. As a result, 62% of leaders increasingly view data outages as a greater financial threat to their business than an economic recession, making resilience an urgent business priority.
“In today’s AI-powered world, trust in data is every organisation’s most valuable asset. Backups are the last line of truth in a world where AI can fabricate, ransomware can encrypt, and a single misconfiguration can cascade across an entire infrastructure in minutes,” said Dave Russell, Senior Vice President and Head of Strategy at Veeam. “World Backup Day is a timely call to action for boards and IT leaders to ensure data resilience and comprehensive backup strategies are in place. In the AI era, it’s not just about recovering your data – it’s about keeping your business functioning and thriving with the trusted data it needs. Too many organisations are still managing risk reactively, when real innovation – and real trust – begin with a foundation of resilient, secure data.”
Data outages: The new top business risk
Trust in data is now the defining factor for business continuity and success. As organisations become increasingly dependent on their data and AI systems, the risk posed by outages has eclipsed even economic recession:
- 76[1]% of organisations report they would not survive more than three days of downtime if their organisation suffered a complete data outage tomorrow.
- Nearly half (44%) of IT leaders are not confident their organisations could recover all critical data within 24 hours of a major cyberattack or data loss event.
The consequences are profound: loss of customer trust, damaged reputation, regulatory fines, compliance failures, and, for many, the threat of total business collapse. In the era of AI, data resilience is not just an IT issue, but a fundamental pillar of organisational trust.
AI oversight and accountability: The missing link in trust
Despite growing AI adoption, boards and leadership teams are falling short in governing AI risk and resilience.
- The survey revealed:38% of boards or leadership teams surveyed have never formally discussed AI-driven or emerging attack types, leaving organisations exposed and undermining trust in their AI capabilities.
- Only 31% of boards review resilience readiness, such as recovery KPIs or failover results, on a quarterly basis, and responsibility for resilience is often split across CIOs, CISOs, Heads of Risk, and COOs.
Less than half of organisations surveyed (49%) link executive KPIs to resilience outcomes, and only 24% of leaders regularly participate in crisis simulations for data loss or disruption.
Without clear ownership and consistent accountability, organisations risk reactive responses to threats rather than proactive, trust-driven strategies for AI and data resilience.
Other key findings from Veeam:
- The human cost: The fallout from cyber incidents is not only technical – 57[2]% of leaders reported employees have resigned, threatened to resign, or burned out following major cyber incidents, with lost productivity and well-being among the top unexpected impacts.
- Leading causes of data loss: External cyberattack (26%) remains the most prevalent cause of data loss, closely followed by human error (23%) and system or hardware failure (16%).
- Outages are widespread and consistent: 83%[3] of organisations experienced data outages that were not resolved immediately in the past 5 years, underscoring the urgent need for resilient, trusted data foundations.
World Backup Day is not just a reminder to back up data – it’s a call for every organisation to review, test, and strengthen their data resilience strategies. The consequences of neglecting backup are profound: loss of customer trust, reputational damage, compliance failures, and even business collapse.
[1] Combines ‘No time – collapse would happen immediately’, ‘Less than 1 hour, please specify in minutes’, ‘1-4 hours’, 5-23 hours’ , ‘1-3 days’
[2] Combines ‘Yes – multiple times’ and ‘Yes – once’
Discussion about this post