Cybersecurity compliance is about more than just passing audits and checking boxes, it is also about assessing how well your organization is maintaining its stated security posture.
Maintaining compliance involves implementing security controls, policies, and procedures to ensure that specific requirements, set by governing bodies, are being met. These requirements include GDPR, HIPAA, PCI DSS, and ISO 27001; remaining compliant ensures that organizations can mitigate risks, avoid legal penalties, and build trust with customers by demonstrating their commitment to data security and privacy. By following compliance standards, businesses can reduce security vulnerabilities, build trust with their customers, and demonstrate their commitment to protecting personal and financial information.
Expert Insights has gathered a wealth of statistics on cybersecurity compliance, helping you to better understand compliance and also act as a benchmark to assess your organization’s own policies and procedures.
General Market Statistics For Cybersecurity Compliance
- The GRC market was valued at $50.5 billion USD in 2024
- This is projected to grow to $104.5 billion by 2031 with a CAGR of 15.4%
- The largest region for this market is North America, and this is the case for two primary reasons:
- Strict laws and regulations in this region
- The presence of many major IT companies
- Europe is expected to become the fastest growing region of the GRC market by 2032
Why Cybersecurity Compliance Matters
- Violating GDPR comes with a maximum penalty of €20 million EUR or 4% of a company’s global annual turnover.
- Failing to meet compliance guidelines can result in hefty fines for each violation, especially for organizations in sensitive fields such as government contractors. Organizations may also lose out on potentially profitable clients, damage their reputation, and increase their risk of a serious security incident.
- These are some of the most common ways that businesses may be non-compliant:
- Absent or inadequate security measures such as data protection and access control
- Either no or unenforced policies and procedures around how an organization handles data
- Insufficient security awareness training, leaving end users unprepared for real-world attacks
- Poor incident response capabilities, making it more difficult for organizations to recover in the event of an attack
What challenges are organizations facing with meeting regulatory compliance requirements?
- According to OneTrust, these are the main drivers that lead organizations to seek out GRC tools:
- Constantly evolving compliance requirements mean that organizations must continually ensure they are in alignment with
- Increased regulatory and risk exposure due to growing third-party and fourth-party relationships
- Siloed or disconnected data
- Over-reliance on manual processes
- Growing demand for integrating external content into GRC architecture
- A 2023 survey by Thomson Reuters of over 180 risk and compliance professionals found that organizations tend to keep their compliance operations in-house due to cost pressures.
- 58% of respondents felt confident in their organization’s ability to tackle compliance concerns. For those who felt prepared to deal with compliance issues, these were the main factors that provided this confidence:
- Having a team of knowledgeable personnel equipped with the resources they needed (42% of respondents)
- Having a strong company culture with equally strong support from management (30% of respondents)
- Conversely, the factors cited as obstacles to a compliance team’s confidence were:
- A lack of knowledgeable personnel
- Inadequate resources
- Poor company culture
- 82% of respondents cited data and cybersecurity concerns as their organization’s greatest risk.
- Almost two-thirds (65%) of respondents said streamlining and automating manual processes would help reduce the complexity and cost of risk and compliance.
- More than half (54%) of respondents indicate that their organization is interested in using generative AI tools such as ChatGPT and other AI-enhanced software solutions, but less than 15% have high levels of trust in the technology.
For more information relating to cybersecurity and compliance, Expert Insights have written a series of top 10 guides, helping you find the ideal solution for your needs. You can read more here:
- The Top Compliance Software
- The Top Compliance Management Solutions
- Governance, Risk, And Compliance (GRC) Buyers’ Guide 2025
- The Top GRC Platforms
