What percentage of enterprise leaders expect an AI agent security incident within 12 months?

97% of large-enterprise security leaders surveyed by Arkose Labs in February 2026 expect a material AI-agent-driven security or fraud incident within 12 months, with nearly half expecting one within six months.

How much of their security budget are enterprises allocating to AI agent risk?

On average, organizations allocate 6% of their security budgets to AI-agent risk. One in ten does not track it as a separate risk category at all, according to the Arkose Labs 2026 Agentic AI Security Report.

What is the AI agent attribution gap?

Only 26% of enterprises surveyed by Arkose Labs said they were very confident they could definitively prove an AI agent caused or was involved in a security incident. This attribution gap creates exposure in both incident response and regulatory defense.

What should organizations do first to address agentic AI security risk?

The first step is an agent inventory. 82% of organizations in a Cloud Security Alliance survey had unknown AI agents running in their infrastructure. Organizations cannot govern what they cannot see. From there, access scoping and least-privilege controls should follow within 30 days.

What regulatory frameworks apply to AI agent security?

NIST NCCoE has published a concept paper on Software and AI Agent Identity and Authorization. OWASP released its Top 10 for Agentic Applications in December 2025. FINRA's 2026 Oversight Report identifies governance considerations for firms using GenAI. HIPAA's Tier 4 willful neglect standard applies to healthcare organizations running AI agents that interact with protected health information.

AI Agent Governance

Enterprise Leaders Know the AI Agent Risk Is Coming — The Controls Aren't Ready

97% of enterprise security leaders expect an AI-agent-driven incident within 12 months. Four 2026 surveys confirm the same governance gap: deployment has outrun controls, visibility, and budget.

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TL;DR:
Four independent 2026 surveys confirm the same finding: enterprise AI agent deployment has outrun governance, budget, and attribution controls. This brief maps the gap, names who faces the steepest exposure, and delivers a 7/30/90-day action plan grounded in verified data.

What you need to know

The finding: 97% of large-enterprise security leaders expect an AI-agent-driven incident within 12 months; average security budget allocation to this risk is 6%.
Who is affected: Any organization deploying AI agents — autonomous systems that act inside enterprise environments using service accounts, API tokens, and application credentials.
Why it matters: AI agents operate through legitimate credentials and can closely resemble authorized system behavior, making detection and attribution difficult without purpose-built controls. Only 26% of enterprises surveyed by Arkose Labs said they were very confident they could definitively prove an AI agent caused an incident.
What to do first: Conduct an agent inventory. Organizations cannot govern what they cannot see — 82% of organizations in a Cloud Security Alliance survey were found to have unknown AI agents running in their infrastructure.
Key regulatory signal: NIST's National Cybersecurity Center of Excellence has published a draft concept paper on AI agent identity and authorization; OWASP formalized the agentic AI attack surface in its Top 10 for Agentic Applications in December 2025.

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