Cyber attacks frequently target startups and the micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) in India because they represent the ‘low-hanging fruit’ due to their limited security budgets. They unfortunately have a high value of the sensitive customer data and make them attractive targets for cyber criminals .
During October 2026, India was under the highest cyber threat pressure in its history. This was primarily driven by AI-driven phishing and identity attacks to industrial ransomware and hybrid cyber warfare. As AI technology becomes more sophisticated, the frequency, scale, and sophistication of cyber attacks will increase multifold across India.
Incidentally, India is already one of the world’s most cyber-attacked nations. and AI is making cyberattacks faster, smarter, and increasingly autonomous.
Mr. Karmendra Kohli, Co-founder and CEO of SecurEyes, a leading global cybersecurity and risk management firm says, ‘’Indian tech startups often underinvest in cybersecurity because they view it as an optional, delayed expense rather than a core survival requirement. This applies particularly to the MSMEs sector in India. In these sectors, cybersecurity budgets are dependent on customer and regulatory pressure.”
He goes on to say that cyber security is treated as an option. This is most prevalent in early-stage founders who typically focus all capital on product development, growth, and marketing, pushing security to a later phase.
Cyber security is essential because it protects the digital systems, networks, and sensitive data from theft, damage, and unauthorized access. It secures personal information, financial records, health data (PHI), and intellectual property. It is critical to prevent operational shutdowns, lost revenue and system failures during an attack. For an organization, a major breach can drive away clients and destroy market value and hence it is critical to preserve customer confidence and brand integrity.
Kohli added that many startups do not allocate funds unless required or mandated. He advocated that regulatory or compliance obligations from organizations such as RBI, IRDA, or other Indian regulators can drive security investment.
Recently, India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi while inaugurating the RBI Data Centre and Cybersecurity Training Institute in Bhubaneswar, stressed the need to protect India’s banking system and digital infrastructure from emerging cyber threats, he warned on ‘cyber terrorism’ saying: ‘Wars today aren’t fought with weapons alone.’
Is Cyber Security Safer With Use Of Artificial Intelligence (AI)?
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is the science of building computers and machines that can think, learn, and make decisions. Since the advent of GPT-3, a large language model with 175 billion parameters that OpenAI released in 2020, there has been tremendous progress but it has also resulted in a number of cyber security challenges.
For both individuals and organizations alike. Threats to individuals include voice cloning, deepfakes, misinformation, and hyper-personalized attacks aimed at named people, particularly high-net-worth individuals and people in positions of authority.
AI-generated identities and documents can make scams more convincing, including fabricated agency ID cards used to gain trust. Kohli mentions UPI-related fraud where criminals use payment or bill-related pretexts and QR codes. Scammers may also seek OTPs by faking identity. Kohli remarked that AI makes it harder to distinguish generated attacks from traditional ones and voice cloning weakens voice and face recognition as informal ways to verify identity.
Organizations face similar challenges. A cybersecurity emergency declared in Japan is cited as an example of the scale of AI-based attacks. This occurred because the AI models escaped guardrails and targeted corporate systems.
Is October 2026 A ‘Black Month’ For Cyber Attacks In India?
October is globally recognized as Cybersecurity Awareness Month, rather than a single "Cyber Day," featuring ongoing digital safety campaigns and educational initiatives throughout the month. In spite of this, October 2026 has earned the label as “Black October” due to a heavy cluster of high-profile global and Indian cybersecurity incidents, data breaches, and critical software vulnerabilities. Recent major cyber attacks include: State Bank of India (SBI) confirmed a cyber security and data exposure incident after approximately 3,75,000 records and 2,722 PDF documents were flagged on the dark web. This cyber attack was perpetrated by a threat actor using the alias "Siriusim".
In another incident an independent security researcher discovered that eight intermediate Certificate Authority (CA) keys belonging to eMudhra were cryptographically weak due to an implementation and key-generation error rather than a traditional hacker intrusion.
In addition, CSIRT Fin, the financial-sector response organization warned of AI-driven exploits targeting non-banking financial companies, digital lending platforms, and payment aggregators.
Kohli reiterates that effective solutions to prevent and stop cyber attacks rely on a multi-layered security approach combining essential technical tools, strict access controls, and regular maintenance.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is the science of building computers and machines that can think, learn, and make decisions. Since the advent of GPT-3, a large language model with 175 billion parameters that OpenAI released in 2020, there has been tremendous progress but it has also resulted in a number of cyber security challenges.
For both individuals and organizations alike. Threats to individuals include voice cloning, deepfakes, misinformation, and hyper-personalized attacks aimed at named people, particularly high-net-worth individuals and people in positions of authority.
AI-generated identities and documents can make scams more convincing, including fabricated agency ID cards used to gain trust. Kohli mentions UPI-related fraud where criminals use payment or bill-related pretexts and QR codes. Scammers may also seek OTPs by faking identity. Kohli remarked that AI makes it harder to distinguish generated attacks from traditional ones and voice cloning weakens voice and face recognition as informal ways to verify identity.
Organizations face similar challenges. A cybersecurity emergency declared in Japan is cited as an example of the scale of AI-based attacks. This occurred because the AI models escaped guardrails and targeted corporate systems.
Is October 2026 A ‘Black Month’ For Cyber Attacks In India?
October is globally recognized as Cybersecurity Awareness Month, rather than a single "Cyber Day," featuring ongoing digital safety campaigns and educational initiatives throughout the month. In spite of this, October 2026 has earned the label as “Black October” due to a heavy cluster of high-profile global and Indian cybersecurity incidents, data breaches, and critical software vulnerabilities. Recent major cyber attacks include: State Bank of India (SBI) confirmed a cyber security and data exposure incident after approximately 3,75,000 records and 2,722 PDF documents were flagged on the dark web. This cyber attack was perpetrated by a threat actor using the alias "Siriusim".
In another incident an independent security researcher discovered that eight intermediate Certificate Authority (CA) keys belonging to eMudhra were cryptographically weak due to an implementation and key-generation error rather than a traditional hacker intrusion.
In addition, CSIRT Fin, the financial-sector response organization warned of AI-driven exploits targeting non-banking financial companies, digital lending platforms, and payment aggregators.
Kohli reiterates that effective solutions to prevent and stop cyber attacks rely on a multi-layered security approach combining essential technical tools, strict access controls, and regular maintenance.
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