Failure to prepare for the worst an alarming norm for SMEs
There’s one frequently overlooked word that I often see in stories and reports concerning technology but barely register because I’ve become almost desensitised to it. That word is ‘unprepared’.
I’m fairly certain that’s not the word many of you were thinking of, but I’ve been thinking about it and the more I do, the more I believe there’s a good argument for highlighting it.
This month, for example, there was a story on this website that began: “Irish SMEs feel unprepared to defend against advanced cyber threats, according to the latest Vodafone Business Cybersecurity Threat Report.”
I must confess to being completely unsurprised by this revelation. I’m sure most of you were not shocked by it either. We probably didn’t even blink when we read that “28% of businesses would be at risk of shutting down after just one ransomware attack”.
But what shaped that response?
One theory that occurred to me was that the industry as a whole is often unprepared for the potentially colossal consequences of its success in marketing its technology.
To my mind, cyber security is a really good manifestation of this. Let’s remember the finding that more than a quarter of SMEs believe they would go out of business after one ransomware attack. Now, let’s go back about 15 years. Would SMEs be saying the same thing? Would they even know what ransomware was? And even if they did, would it be capable of unleashing such devastating mayhem on their operations?
I sincerely doubt that it would.
Would 50% of SMEs place cyber security among their top five priorities back then? Highly unlikely. But what is particularly disturbing in 2025 is that many still don’t know where to start. As if things aren’t complicated enough, while SMEs are starting to use AI in their own business, 69% don’t have the right security measures in place to safely deploy these technologies.
I would be inclined to argue that this is not a bug but a feature of a lot of technology advances. While it’s logical that deployment comes before security, it’s dangerous that developments in security can sometimes appear reactive to successful attacks. Think of it this way: there are many occasions when the cyber attackers appear to be agile and innovative and the industry looks like it’s struggling to keep up. Unprepared, you might say.
Perhaps that’s to be expected. After all, it’s difficult to be prepared for all eventualities. As Sinead Perry, head of SMB sales – small & medium business at Vodafone Ireland, said: “Today, SMEs manage more data than ever before and operate in a complex digital environment that rivals larger businesses. This makes them attractive targets, and with AI in the mix, this threat is evolving fast. SMEs must act now to strengthen their resilience and protect the future of their business.”
And while it’s broadly positive that SMEs are in a position to manage more data and operate in a digital environment that rivals larger businesses, there’s also quite a few drawbacks, one of which Perry articulated when she noted that SMEs “are big enough to be a target but often don’t have the same security resources as larger firms”.
This again highlights a lack of preparation or awareness of the potential effects on SMEs of the increasingly digital environment they find themselves operating in. Can anything be done to make the industry, vendors, channel partners and customers better prepared?
Well, consider this comment from Perry: “Irish SMEs now face two major challenges: defending against AI-driven threats and ensuring their own use of AI is secure.” Place that in the context of the huge hype around AI and its ‘inclusion’ in nearly every product and service and it doesn’t exactly inspire confidence.
The message to customers seems to be: “You need to use AI because it’s great.” And then, some little time after the customer starts using AI: “Oh, by the way, we forgot to mention that using AI will make your business less secure.”
Maybe that’s just the way the industry is configured but, if so, it’s easy to understand why companies find themselves ‘unprepared’ so often.
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